"How are you feeling?"

Red took a deep breath, assessing himself for a few moments. "Good," he concluded, and Liz leaned in for a kiss.

It was a question Liz had asked Red each and every morning since Stark administered his first treatment. The whole thing had become something of a ritual—waking up next to Red, studying his face throughout his last phase of sleep, memorizing every flicker and twitch his slumbering features could offer, and, yes, asking him how he was feeling once he finally awoke…

It had been weeks now since he'd had a truly bad day; he felt pretty run down when he first started the treatment, but Stark had warned them that was likely. His body was hard at work repairing itself—that was the hope, at least.

Most days were good now, and Red could manage pretty much his usual level of activity without any adverse effects. There were days when it seemed like he felt significantly better than he had been feeling the past few years—but that could possibly be wishful thinking and neither of them wanted to get ahead of themselves or jinx things.

Some days were especially good days, and on those days, Liz's morning check in had a tendency to take an amorous turn—at Red's rather enthusiastic instigation, more often than not. Other days, the check in was interrupted by Agnes and Red's cat conspiring to drag him and Liz out of bed for breakfast long before either of them would've moved voluntarily.

Today seemed on track to be shaping up as one of those especially good ones.

"Stark's coming by in a little while with the latest test results."

Red let out a sigh. "Don't remind me."

"I don't understand why you'd dread seeing him. He's only had good news for you so far."

"It's the pessimist in me. Everything is going so well, I can't help but feel like it's about to all come crashing down again at any moment."

"It won't."

"How are you so sure?"

"I won't let it," she insisted.

Red's mouth moved wordlessly for a moment.

Liz couldn't promise that. No matter how much she wished it, she didn't have that kind of power or control over their world. But she had been doing everything that was within her power and control to do to help Red get well and she had no plans to stop now.

"I love you," he said eventually, his voice choked with emotion.

A beat passed in silence before Liz leaned in and took his mouth, demanding and a little rough with nipping teeth and assertive tongue; Red met her enthusiasm eagerly, quick to welcome her attention and encourage its escalation. She threw a leg over his body to straddle him and he groaned when she settled, his growing excitement trapped between them.

"I love you, too," she said, breathless, against his mouth, as she rolled and rocked her hips until his cock had stiffened fully. Reaching down, she freed him from his pajama bottoms and took him inside her in a smooth, gasping slide, throwing her head back at the building tension in her belly. She felt so very full every time she ground herself down, digging her fingernails into the flesh at his sides.

Those sharp spikes of pain moved Red's hips, had him pressing closer, seeking more. That had been an interesting thing to experiment with these past few weeks—just how much enjoyment Red got out of some well-placed, controlled, purposeful pain, rather than the aches that came from illness or injury. It was fortunate that he did, because Liz had such an ingrained tendency to be aggressive in bed, and it was nice not to have to downplay it for once.

Her hips moved with a fluidity guided by his hands, which were cool against the bare skin of her ass where he gripped her beneath the hem of his stolen dress shirt, in contrast to the heat buried between her legs. She bent to take his lips again, to taste his ecstasy, drink down his moans…

"God, I wish we told him we weren't free until noon."

"You're the one who insisted on updating your colleagues in person this afternoon, when a phone call is more than sufficient."

"It's common courtesy. I don't need to add any fuel to the fire for when I go back to work."

"Back to work. Right." He ran his fingers down her thighs and back up again, thoughtful and a little teasing, and Liz felt a delightful shiver at the stimulation. "I don't suppose Harold would sign off on me feeding the task force names from afar, would he?"

"Not without a good explanation for why I'd have to be by your side. We've been pushing it with this sabbatical as it is, you know that."

"Unfortunately," he said.

Red looked up at her with such a… a fierce longing in his eyes that Liz could barely breathe. She knew the only thing that kept him from making more of those once-forgotten offers to run off together was his reluctance to uproot Agnes again. Because this—them, their family—meant more than The Blacklist now. Priorities had shifted; taking out the scum of the earth personally was less important than it once was, all his machinations were less important.

"Maybe we can figure something out. I'll see what I can do."

Red reached up and cupped her cheek, running his thumb over her soft skin. "Thank you," he said, with a quiet earnestness that Liz had only experienced on very few occasions. She never quite knew how to handle how it made her feel in the past, and she certainly didn't now—but at least now she had an outlet to show him. Words were so much trickier than actions, sometimes.

She started moving again, urgent now, pushing past his hand so she could kiss him again, deep and searching, as they hurtled along towards completion.