Chapter 31

It took tremendous effort for Harm to open his eyes. He was definitely going to have to take more vitamins if he was going to keep this up. Why hadn't he and Mac gotten together ten years ago? He found himself barely able to open his eyes, and already his body was reacting to the realization that Mac was unceremoniously draped across his chest, her one hand leaning against his face, her other hand… well… someplace else.

Brushing her hair away from her face, Harm couldn't resist smiling at the memory of last night. He didn't know what had gotten into her, but he would be forever grateful that it had, whatever it was. Gently shifting Mac's weight to one side so he could see her face, he was delighted when he was rewarded with a bright smile.

"Good morning," Mac grinned more brightly.

"Back at you, beautiful." Harm leaned forward and kissed the top of her head.

"Do you want help packing?" Mac shifted further into the crook of his arm.

"Packing?" Harm wasn't completely awake yet. Well, at least not all of him.

"To stay." Mac pulled away and sat up to look Harm in the face more completely. When he didn't say a word, she unconsciously reached down and pulled the sheet up against her chest.

"You want me to stay?" Harm repeated softly.

"I thought we already covered this last night," Mac shrugged.

"No, last night you mentioned you wanted me in your life. Then you proceeded to seduce me with such military precision that if I were Napoleon, you'd be running my empire this morning." Harm picked up her hand and kissed it loudly.

"Harm, this is serious. I thought you understood. You said last week you didn't want to leave. I said last night I didn't want you to leave either. I thought it was settled." Mac was getting a little worried. Not that she would change anything about last night, but she had built up this whole new little world in her mind, and in it Harm was most definitely NOT merely an occasional bedmate.

"You're saying you want me to move in here? With you?" The magnitude of this conversation was suddenly becoming clear to him.

Biting her lower lip again, all Mac could do was nod her head yes.

Harm reached out and pulled Mac into his arms with such force he almost knocked the wind out of her. Before she could gasp for air, his lips had crashed down on hers, another tangle of emotions erupting in the morning light.

Her arms dropped the sheet she'd been holding between them and snaked around his neck, giving fully into this wonderful embrace. No longer craving air, but every inch of his body on hers, she slid her leg over his hips and straddled him. Pulling away from his lips, she began nibbling a fiery trail along his neck, somehow managing to mumble between kisses, "Does this mean yes?"

Pushing her away from his neck, Harm flipped Mac over onto her back. Leaning over her soft body, his face only inches away from hers, "No."

Mac's heart slammed to her stomach. "No?"

"No, it's not settled." Recognizing the fear in her eyes, Harm quickly continued. "What I mean is: will you marry me?" The words said, he held his breath. This wasn't the romantic setting in which he had always envisioned someday asking a woman, especially this woman, to marry him, but he was tired of being afraid to push. He didn't want to just live with Mac. He wanted her to be his wife, and to be her husband. He wanted it all, the entire package, with or without kids.

Mac stared at him incredulously. She had felt confident that she had read his signals correctly and he would want to move in, but she had never allowed herself to dream that all these years of dancing around their feelings would come to a head so quickly.

Nodding her head frantically, Mac struggled to make sound come out of her mouth. Batting away the tears of joy, a small voice whispered, "Yes."

She was unable to say anything more before he took her into his arms again, and as he had done so well the night before, showed her slowly and gently just how much he loved her. All of her: the scars, the burns… all of her.

When they were finally forced out of bed by an appetite for something more than each other, Harm found it almost impossible to keep his hands off of her.

Standing by the edge of the bed in nothing but his birthday suit, Harm helped Mac into her robe. Spinning her around, he kissed her nose. "I love you," he whispered as he dragged one finger from her chin down her throat, past the swell between her breasts and stopping along the edge of her scar. Spreading his hand flat across the expanse of the markedly pink flesh, he rubbed lightly and whispered again, "I love you."

Blushing from head to toe, Mac pulled back and tied her robe. "If you don't get some food in me soon, there's going to be a lot less of me to love," she teased. In reality she was incredibly relieved that all her scars hadn't mattered. She had pushed her fears to the back of her mind as she followed her battle plan, but still, the inevitable doubts had nibbled away, threatening to dissolve her resolve. His gentle attention to every inch of her body had convinced her completely of the veracity of his proclamations to her weeks ago. He really had wanted her in 'that' way.

Pulling on his boxers, Harm looked around. "We probably will want to consider getting a bigger place. I'm not sure much of my stuff will fit here."

"Sure it will!" Mac stepped around him and began opening empty drawers, then turned to her closet and flung the doors open. Half the closet was completely empty. "I made room for you," she grinned proudly.

"Pretty sure of yourself, weren't you?" Harm stepped up behind her and wrapped his arms around her stomach, nibbling at the base of her neck.

"I'd hoped," she admitted, her head dropping back against him.

Kissing her cheek soundly, "I'm glad," he smiled.

Anxious to start moving him in, Harm and Mac hurried through breakfast.

Harm's apartment

Later that morning

"I think you're right. There's no way I can get enough of this stuff into my place for you to feel at home." Mac sighed, tossing some of Harm's photos into a box.

"As long as we're together, I don't care about things." Harm had put down the clothes he was packing and walked over to Mac. "I love you, soon-to-be Mrs. Rabb. I don't care where we live, or what we have, so long as I have you."

Mac stared blankly at this man before her. "I can't believe we wasted so many years." With a heavy sigh, she dropped her head on his shoulder.

"I pretty much came to that same conclusion on the carrier. I had intended to bring up what I wanted for the rest of our lives, but I wasn't exactly planning for things to turn out quite the way they did." Placing a short kiss on Mac's head, Harm grinned impishly at the memory of last night. "I'm not sure what came over you, but I'm very glad it did."

Mac lifted her head and stepped back. "You mean who."

"Excuse me?" Harm wasn't too sure he was going to like the sound of this.

"Who got into me," Mac chuckled, "You owe last night to the General."

Harm's eyes opened wider than the moon. "At the risk of repeating myself… excuse me?"

Mac chuckled again, amused by the borderline horrified look on Harm's face. "In a nutshell, he told me if I wanted to get anywhere in our relationship, I was going to have to behave like a marine and 'storm the beach'. Your beach. That's why he gave you this morning off." Mac closed the lid on the box she'd been packing and reached for the tape.

"The General actually told you to storm my beach?"

"Yeah, that pretty much covers it." Mac smiled at him. "You'd better put this in the car. We've got to report to the office in less than two hours."

"He really said 'storm my beach?'" Harm was still somewhat dumbfounded.

"Yes." Mac was starting to lose patience. "Is something wrong?"

"Well, other than I'm not so sure how I feel about my CO being involved in the strategical planning of my seduction, I really do have to remember to thank that man." Harm pushed the box aside and pulled Mac into his arms. "How much time did you say we have before we need to report?" he whispered into her lips.

"Enough."

With that, the two new lovers christened Harm's apartment for the first, and last, time before moving into their own new world.

The End