She automatically woke up around seven, but only just so. Enough to realize that there was a hand splayed across her stomach and a familiar pressure behind her.

From some groggy crevice of her brain, she realized that as of seven hours ago, it was Valentine's Day. And it was a Saturday. Which meant wake up sex didn't have to be rushed.

She turned around, kissed him out of unconsciousness, told him happy Valentine's, and that was all it took. She hooked her leg around his waist and he made her head spin and her heart stop and her fogged over brain spark awake in a display of fireworks.

She realized she hadn't been ready to wake up. She'd just needed Deeks. She cuddled next to him and he kissed her head and held her until she fell asleep again. The next conscious element of her surrounding she identified was an awesome smell, something chocolaty, maybe cinnamon. Her stomach growled loudly enough for her to have the decency to be embarrassed, and she thought Damn, really? But her snuggle buddy wasn't around to hear it, and the realization that he wasn't in the room along with the heavenly scent coming from the kitchen pulled her out of bed.

Before she could ask what he was cooking, because damn it if that wasn't what she'd been thinking about since she woke up, he grabbed her waist, the quiet song he'd been humming coming out of his mouth louder now that there was somebody to sing it to. He took her hand, his voice smooth and rich in her ear. "You're just too good to be true, can't take my eyes off of you. You'd be like heaven to touch, I want to hold you so much. You're, uh, badada…" He kind of hummed the last part before giving up. "I sorta forgot the rest."

She laughed. "That's okay. You got the important part." In a voice considerably less melodic than his, she stumbled over the next verse, still swaying in his arms. "At long last love has arrived, and I thank God I'm alive. You're just too good to be true… can't take my eyes off of you." She kind of smiled, giggling at how uncharacteristically sappy she was allowing herself to be, and when she met his eyes she saw an emotion that she was done denying and ignoring reflected back at her. Love.

For a split second, she considered telling him how much she loved him. But instead she shook her head, goofy smile still in place, butterflies fluttering in her stomach at how he was looking at her, like she was golden. She put her hand on his chest. "Good morning, Shaggy."

"Happy Valentine's Day, Kensalina."

"Is this my present?" she asked, looking at the counter where heart shaped pancakes sat in a stack with white cream oozing down them. "Please say yes."

"I thought you hated my cooking."

"I thought that you said I'd never tasted your real cooking."

"All right, touché. Yes, Fern, the pancakes are for you."

"Yes!" She sidled over to the plate on the counter, tearing a large piece off of one, smearing it in the cream and plopping it in her mouth before Deeks could protest.

"Wait, wait– Really, Kens?"

She shrugged. "Hungry." The she moaned. He tried to ignore how sexy it sounded. "So good."

"Old family recipe."

She raised her eyebrow, obviously not believing him.

"Okay, actually the recipe was courtesy of Paula Dean. But those fluffy indulgences were all me."

"The kid got skills."

"Took you long enough to acknowledge how awesome I am. And by the way, dinner at 1900 hours. Don't make plans."

She snorted, digging a fork into the stack of pancakes. "Right, because I'm really going to be spending Valentine's Day with someone who isn't my boyfriend."

Sometimes Deeks forgot that wow, they were officially exclusive to each other, and it was fucking awesome. He might have puffed his chest out a little when he replied, "Yeah, right." He smiled. "That reminds me…"

He left the room, and when he reentered he was holding blue roses, a box of chocolates, and another box with a bow on it. Also a teddy bear, because it had looked snuggle worthy at Wal-mart, and Kensi loved snuggles.

"Oh, what… Deeks…" She put down her fork. "What did you–?"

"Gifts for the princess."

"Blue roses? How did you manage to find blue roses?" All the while she was searching for a vase. She settled for a tall glass.

"They're white, dyed blue. And I know you hate flowers but–"

"They're beautiful. Thank you." She smiled as she took the chocolates and the teddy bear from him. "You're such a freaking hopeless romantic."

"Guilty as charged. But you missed one."

Not missed, she thought. Carefully avoided. She eyed the velvet cube in his hand before reaching for it slowly, like it was susceptible to biting. Deeks watched her, trying to hide his amusement. "It's a box, Kensi. It's not going to hurt you."

That was where he was wrong. The last box like this had hurt her. A lot. Had kept coming back to bite her in the ass for years. She tried to stay sensible. She'd only been with him for two months, hardly that. And he would be on one knee if…

Nope. Uh-uh. Kensi freaked herself out way too easily. She raised an eyebrow at Deeks as if to say, 'You know exactly what I'm thinking, and if it is, I'll kill you.' Deeks just kept grinning at her. Idiot.

She opened the box. She smiled. "A bracelet." It was simple, an understated golden chain wrapped around itself, forming tight helixes. She looked closely at the engraving on the small tag near the clasp. Their anniversary.

She wasn't even sure he knew it, if it was stupid that she knew it, but he did, and when she reached for his hand she tried to convey how much everything meant to her. "Thank you." She kissed him. "Why are you so good to me?"

"Because I love you." This time he was the one to kiss her. "And you deserve the best."

She didn't feel like it, like she deserved him. She reached under the LAPD t-shirt she was wearing, extracting the knife she had sheathed against her abdomen as soon as she'd climbed out of bed.

"So this is how it's going to end. Gutted by the woman I love on Valentine's Day. Can't say I saw this coming."

She gave him a WTF look and handed him the knife. It was her dad's. "I'm sorry if I misinterpreted this metaphor or allegory or whatever the first time around, but this is something that was important to me and my dad. But now it's more important to me for you to have it, to protect yourself, protect me. If your ready to take it… or whatever. A knife can be just a knife if you want it to be, but I think I need it to be more than that now, after everything, if you want–"

He interrupted her babbling by pressing his lips to hers. He caught them half open, and his mouth worked against hers. She tasted like cinnamon and maple syrup.

They probably needed to stop interrupting each other with kisses, but what the hell, it worked better than when they used to attempt to communicate with words. He smiled. "I love you, and whatever you want this knife to entail, consider it taken care of."

She gulped. If he knew everything she wanted that knife to represent, it would probably send him running after only two months in a relationship. She would never admit that sometimes she dreamed about a rounded stomach with feet pressing against the inside of her abdomen, and houses with fingerpaint on the walkway. Cars with "just married" painted on the back, white dresses, retirement.

The latter used to scare her senseless, because she couldn't imagine direction without a job. Now she couldn't imagine not spending the last few decades of her life with the man that she loved. She frowned.

"What?"

"Is it okay?" She couldn't shake the feeling that she got it wrong.

"Kensi, this is the nicest thing anybody's given me in a long time. It's great." He grabbed her hand, the one with her bracelet hanging above her palm, sitting on her wrist. "Really."

She wondered if this was the opportune moment to say 'I love you'. Again, she decided against it, but she could feel it coming, soon. And she was pretty sure he already knew.

"Can I eat the pancakes?"

"I see where your mind's been this entire conversation."

"Where did I set the chocolate?"

"Oh my God. You are a bottomless pit. An endless void. A vacuum."

"I think I deserve some of your pancakes for that remark."

"Only if you share your chocolate."

"We'll see, Shaggy."

"Really?"

Maybe. "No."

He sighed. "Your one true love. Food. How could I ever expect to rival it."

She smiled, took a bite of her pancake, and looked at him, her independent hand toying with her new bracelet. "You're a close second."