A/N: Sorry this took so long! Real life intrudes. This was a much longer chapter but I'm still nitpicking the other half. I thought I should post this now because the rest might be another week. Hang on to your hats. Chapter 11 is so hot that I'm even embarrassing myself as I write it. On with the show...

~~Chapter 10

James stared up at me; I stared down at her.

I wanted to touch her, to draw my finger along the line of her jaw and down her neck but I didn't want to spook her. I couldn't stop my eyes from roaming over her body. Her breasts were heavy for such a slender woman and they were clearly visible through the wet sheet she used as a towel. I squeezed my hands into fists then flexed my fingers, keeping my arms stiff at my sides. I took a step back.

"Let's talk after you put some clothes on," I said.

I waited until she disappeared into her room then found my saddle bag. I fished around in the small hidden compartment at the bottom. I took out what was in there and slipped it into my pocket. I took a deep breath then blew it out slowly through pursed lips, feeling more nervous at that moment than I did when I kicked in a door to a room full of armed outlaws. That was just facing death. This was facing ... the rest of my life.

I picked up James's smelly pile of clothes and sank them in her bathwater to soak. Mortimer scratched at the door and I let him out to his snug little house on the porch. I fussed with the coals under the pot of rabbit stew. I toyed with the thought of making apple biscuits. I pictured Doc watching me in that keen way he had when he thought I might be sick with something. I finally settled into my chair in front of the fire with a cup of coffee.

James stepped out of her room and stood close to the wall next to the doorway with her hands in the pockets of yet another pair of baggy dungarees. Her hair was fashioned in a loose queue draped over her shoulder. A pink ribbon was tied in a bow at the end. I sipped my coffee and waited for her to speak.

"You really would stay?" she asked.

"If that's what you want," I said.

"You have a life outside of this valley, I do not."

"You could."

"With you?"

"I'm prepared to beg," I said - and I wasn't kidding.

James was silent for so long that I wavered for a moment, thinking that perhaps I should get down on one knee. As the silence stretched, I began to believe that I'd made a mistake, that I'd misread her. That it was too soon. That her silence was her reluctance to hurt my feelings. Even if she said yes, did she love me? She was so young. She didn't know any other men. How could she know what love was, anyway?

"Listen, James - ," I began.

"I always thought I'd be a doctor, not a … wife," she said.

"I don't mind doing the cooking," I said.

James blinked. "You would let me be a doctor?"

"Since when have you ever asked my permission for anything?"

"It's illegal for a white man to marry a Negro."

"Not in Kansas."

"I thought you wanted to be far from there."

I stared into my cup of coffee. My reflection was faint and dappled with firelight.

"I have to go back," I said. "I need to take care of some business, say goodbye to my … people. But after that, we can go anywhere you like. In San Francisco, people tend to mind their own business. Doc tells me there's a good medical school in Mexico City."

"What about the woman in Dodge?"

"Kitty."

"You - you said you love ... Kitty."

"Not like this."

"Does she know?"

"It's a fight we had for seven years."

"Sounds painful."

"It's over."

"I doubt Kitty thinks so."

I stood and faced her.

"I can't make Kitty stop loving me, James. The truth is, she will always be close to my heart. But I've only ever felt this way about one woman and I let her die in my arms without telling her. I vowed that if I was lucky enough to find another, I would tell her every day so I could die with those words on my lips."

She regarded me for a long moment then raised a wry brow. "You've been reading too much Byron," she said.

"I thought that was pretty good."

James laughed. "It was very nice."

"It occurs to me that you haven't answered my question," I said.

"You haven't actually asked me one."

I reached into my pants pocket and fished out a ring. The plain gold band was slender but felt heavy in my palm. It seemed to glow in the firelight.

"Doc won this in a bar game. He carried it around for a year then gave it to me as a joke. Now, I'm not so sure he was joking." I took her hand. "It will be a while before we can stand before a preacher but I'd be proud if you'd wear it now."

I slipped the ring on her finger. I didn't know what to do with my hands so I hooked my thumbs through my belt.

"Be my wife, James Anna."

She flung herself at me. I caught her, stumbling back. She pecked hard kisses all over my face, her fingers wringing my hair.

"I guess that's a yes," I said, fighting to stay upright.

I hiked her up so that I held her full length against me. She leaned back. She held my face between her warm hands.

"Yes. Yes! I love you, Marshal Dillon. I've loved you since you fell off your horse and landed at my feet."

"It was over for me when you pointed that big old rifle at my head."

"But you thought I was a boy."

"Obviously, part of me didn't."

"It's very strange," she said.

I chuckled. "I know a couple of people who would not disagree with you."

"I felt as if … as if I knew you were coming. Does that make sense?"

I shrugged with a tilt of my head. "Makes as much sense as anything else. I put that ring on my mantle and forgot about it. Before I rode out of Dodge, I actually went back into my house to get it."

"This farm will become yours," said James.

"I don't believe in that. What's yours is yours. I don't have much but what's mine, is ours."

"We are a family, now."

We gazed at each other in the low light. I set her back on her feet.

"It won't be easy," I said quietly. "Once we leave the valley - ."

"I will be a boy again until we find a place where I can be a proper wife and doctor."

"I guess that might work," I mused. "You won't have to do it for more than a few days."

"What happens next?" James asked.

"After we settle, you'll go to doctor college and I'll put up my feet and get fat."

"I mean, now."

"Well, that rabbit needs another hour or so before the potatoes go in," I said. "I thought I'd make apple biscuits. I've got a craving for something sweet … What?"

"In the Bible, a betrothal is as lawfully binding as a marriage," said James.

It finally got through my thick skull what she was talking about. All the blood from my brain rushed to my sex. I put my hands in my pockets and made a minor adjustment in the position of my cock.

"Do you know what -." I cleared my throat. " – you're asking?"

"Yes."

"Don't you want to uh, wait?"

"No."

Her expression was so earnest that I turned my face to the side and tried not to grin.

"Okay. Sure," I said. "I guess we could ... not wait."

"You needn't worry that you might injure me. I know what to expect. My anatomy book says that if you - ."

"All right, all right. It's not surgery," I laughed, wrapping my hands around her waist. "I may not know much else about women but trust me when I tell you that I don't need any anatomy book."

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