** ROSE POV **

We walked through Paris like we owned it that day, hand in hand, taking in the sights as though we weren't paratroopers less than a day from returning to combat. I kept pushing the thought to the back of my mind until I was finally enjoying myself so much that it stayed there.

Every so often, out of the corner of my eye, I would catch Dick watching me. He was always so even-keeled and soft-spoken. I was sure that he thought I was ridiculously immature as I gushed over the artwork and the architecture and a million other little things that free-spirited young women gush about when they are wandering through Paris with a handsome military man on their arm.

We were standing on a bridge overlooking the Seine River, and I was waxing poetic about something when I noticed that he was watching me again, a small smile on his lips. I blushed and cut my soliloquy short.

"I'm sorry. I'm rambling again, I know. You must think I'm so childish… love-struck and head stuck up in the clouds, just gushing about everything all day like I have been."

He leaned back against the railing that I was toeing nervously with my boot, tilting his head back and squinting into the slowly sinking sun before an answer that caught both of us completely off guard slipped unbidden out of his mouth.

"On the contrary, I think you're beautiful. I haven't been able to take my eyes off of you all day." My eyes met his and we looked at each other for a long moment before he finally spoke again. "It'll be dark soon. How about seeing the Eiffel Tower at night?"

We walked back toward the monument in silence, the carefree atmosphere now shifted as a nervous energy floated between us. His hand, which hadn't left mine for much of the day, was now shoved deep into his pocket, as though he were forcibly holding it there. I curled and uncurled my fingers, unsure of what to do with my own hands, before finally putting them in my own pockets.

We reached the Tower and wordlessly climbed the steps, reaching the deserted observation deck in the orange glow of dusk. I walked over to the railing and gazed out over the city, my mind drifting unwillingly toward the unmistakable pull on my heart. My nagging logic reminded me that the situation was hopeless, deflating the bubble of hope that had swelled in my chest earlier in the day. I had to stop torturing myself. I was fighting a war. I couldn't afford to be battling inside as well.

** DICK POV **

As soon as the words slipped out, the officer in me scolded myself for the lapse in control. She was one of my paratroopers. I was her superior. I could not have feelings for her. I just couldn't. It became a mantra. A cadence that I chanted in my head from the bridge to the observation deck of the Tower.

She's a paratrooper. I don't have feelings for her. I can't reach out and touch her. I must maintain control.

I made my way around the observation deck, moving in the opposite direction from her, meeting her again just as I finished reciting my cadence again. She stood against the rail, the evening sun backlighting her in stunning profile. In short, she took my breath away. Any lie I had been telling myself about not having feelings for her disappeared in that moment. My first thought was to walk up behind her, wrap my arms around her waist and hold her close. On my shoulder, the Nixon-devil laughed because, despite the lie about my feelings, the rest of the speech I'd been reciting to myself had been true.

She's a paratrooper. I am falling for her. I can't reach out and touch her. I must maintain control.

"Hard to believe that we have to go back tomorrow," she said aloud, snapping me out of my thoughts.

"At least it looks as though we won't be seeing action for a little while. Nix was talking about a Mid-March action."

She nodded absently. It seemed that we were both suddenly very tired. Tired from the day. Tired of being away from home. Tired of the war. Tired of fighting whatever this was between us. She released a deep sigh and I nudged her so that she looked up at me, at last offering me a weak smile.

"You ready to go back?"

She turned and looked back out over the now-twinkling city for a moment before finally nodding, "Yeah, we probably should go back and get some rest. Early day headed back to the grind tomorrow."

We made our way back down the steps and out onto the street for the short walk back to the hotel. She was playing nervously with her fingers again, and I knew that she was harboring some embarrassment about everything that had happened. Looking at it from her perspective, once we were back to reality, she would have to answer to me as everyone else did. She would be back among the men of Easy. Among men who knew her and read her well. I really only had one person to fool. Two, if you counted Welsh. She had an entire company. If there were any benefit to me running the battalion now, this was it. It gave us much needed distance.

Her arm brushed mine, a familiar jolt of electricity surging through me, reminding me that we didn't have that distance between us yet. I glanced back at her as we walked. Her eyes were troubled, full of questions. I could almost feel her mind spinning around the idea that she had made a fool out of herself, trying to talk herself into the idea that whatever she had been feeling between us the last few days had been a figment of her imagination. That it wasn't reciprocated. As much as I knew I couldn't act on those feelings, I yearned to reassure her. To let her know that I had been feeling it too, even if there was nothing that could be done about it.

I offered my arm. She looked at it, then up at me, surprised. I smiled, trying to convey with my eyes what I couldn't afford to speak out loud, and I could see the tension leave her face. She bit her lower lip and slipped her arm through mine, her fingers lightly gripping my bicep as we made our way down the street and into the hotel. In the hallway approaching our rooms, she sighed again.

"Back to business as usual tomorrow."

"Yes, I suppose it is."

Stopping outside her door, she looked up and captured my eyes with hers again.

"Thank you for the last couple of days, sir. I know Captain Nixon forced you to come here, but you've been…" she started, moving back into the formality that would come all too soon in the morning.

I slipped her hand carefully from my arm, brushing my lips across her knuckles without breaking eye contact, and saw her take a deep breath. There was so much I wanted to say, and so very little that I could, but I didn't want her to leave Paris wondering if she had created all of those moments in her imagination.

"No, Rose. Thank you. The last couple of days have been just… well… Please just know, even once we get back to the real world, there is nobody on Earth that I would rather spend time with than you." There. I had said all that I could. Her eyes told me that she understood what I couldn't say, and she stood on tiptoe and pressed the softest kiss to my cheek.

"Till tomorrow, Dick. Good night," she said quietly.

As she backed away and moved toward her door, I breathed, "Sweet dreams, Rose."