He hadn't kissed her. And much more strangely, they had not been intimate since the morning he had shaken his fey mood. Although the teasing and innuendoes continued into bedtime he always finished by given her a chaste kiss on her cheek, and bidding her good-night, turning himself away from her and falling asleep with aggravating rapidity. Until the day that he didn't.

It was a day that would be burned into Scarlett's memory for perpetuity. It had been another good day. The Indian Summer sun had lit up the meadows, and the leaves gleamed dark green, filled to the bursting point with the last pretense of summer. Rhett had taken Scarlett, his mother, Rosemary and the children to a picnic in the carriage. Garreth had been at his most delightful, singing songs in a high sweet treble to the cart horse that they had tied to a shady tree, feeding it shrubs and grasses and small hard apples. Ella had been content to be a child again for this one day, and Miss Eleanor and Rosemary feasted on the still unfamiliar novelty of the Butler household without tension. Rosemary, who was on the watch, noted that Rhett's eyes hardly ever left Scarlett, sitting like a wood fairy on a log, the soft wind freeing tendrils of black hair which blew around her face.

The good humor had lasted all through the day and the evening , throughout dinner and right until bedtime. And then the atmosphere changed and Scarlett would never know what had tipped it. She had said something inconsequential, sitting at her dressing table, getting ready for bed, brushing her long black hair until it shimmered in the lamplight. She had been laughing at him, her mind still full of sun and wind and apples, when he suddenly stood in front of her and reached out a large brown hand and tipped her face towards him, eyes lingering on her soft lips.

"Do you want to see if we remember how to do this?" he had whispered, huskily. He was too close, much too close. Scarlett felt a drumming sound in her head, a weakness in her knees and a wave of heat suffused through her body. She managed to hold his gaze and saw him looking back at her, seeing her, with desire in his black eyes and something indefinable that made her weak-kneed and foolish. It was like a dream, and Scarlett had become wary of dreams. She lifted her hand to touch his face, motor memory tensing her whole body with the expectation of his hand to come up to catch her wrist like before. But he held still while she traced her fingertips over his cheek and lips, like a blind person reaching into a stream to caress smooth round pebbles in the water. It was awkward, frightening, and oh, so terribly vulnerable, and every reptile instinct urged her to run, to hide from that naked black gaze. But she stayed. His face hovered above hers and she felt him tremble beneath her hand but he didn't move, and there was a waiting, suspenseful expression in his eyes that she didn't know. A subterranean well-spring of courage burst forth, and she suddenly wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling his face down towards her and kissed him.

She didn't know what she had expected. He had drawn her onto the day-bed never breaking contact, kissing her leisurely for what seemed like hours, kissing her like he hadn't done since the night of his proposal. So long that she forgot how awkward it was, that she was uncomfortable in his arms, or that she was nervous, or that they hadn't kissed in many years. She had had to learn his lips again, the softness and the hardness of his mouth and later, the touch of his tongue, clumsy at first in its attempt to recall a forgotten rhythm. "It must all have been terribly confusing to you." he said whispered against her mouth when they finally separated for air. She had reached for him blissfully, wanting to pull his head back down to her, not confused at all until he suddenly caught her wrists and stopped her and a black veil came crashing back down and she twisted away from him. "Get away from me, you cad," she hissed. "What kind of a game do you think you're playing? I hate you! I'm not doing this. Ever again. Let me go!"

"Scarlett". His hands were on her, pushing back her hair, trying to pry her body open, trying to force her to look at him. "Scarlett". He pulled her on his lap and she resisted, fighting like a small feral animal against his huge brown hands that lifted her like a rag doll and pressed her against his chest. "Scarlett. Listen to me". Something in that voice got through to her fury and she lifted her eyes into a face as haggard as winter but with none of the blandness that had characterized it for so many years. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "We can't. We can't rush this Scarlett. Not again. There is too much broken … to much debris to cut our feet on if we are not very very careful. I don't know if it's possible to mend it. I know this makes no sense. We've been sleeping together for years and I've used you abominably these past nights but this is different. And there are things you need to know – things you deserve to know – before you make a choice whether you even want to try."

He arose from the settee and sat down on their bed, still holding her to his chest. "I don't want to run away. I want to hold you tonight but I must ask you not to touch me. If you do I will devour you whole and not even leave a crumb behind because I'm frightened and tense and drowning myself in a woman is the easiest way to escape. I don't want that." Scarlett saw the almost inhuman effort that revelation had cost him, and her fury ebbed slightly. "I need you to know that I'm not rejecting you although I understand why you would think so." She nodded into his chest. He exhaled. "We're both tired and drained and we need to sleep. Tomorrow, we talk. Properly." She nodded again, and with gentle hands he turned her slight form away from him until she was facing the wall. He drew the covers over her and slid up behind her, rested his chin on her shoulder and slung his arm lightly over her waist.

And Scarlett didn't know if to be hopeful, or devastated, or simply, terribly confused.

Disclaimer: The characters belong to MM

And thanks for the reviews – I am loving the timeline discussion because that was always terribly hazy to me. I had Ella down as 13-14 if the story is 5-6 years after the ending of the book but maybe you'all are right and she is really 12-13 and we can't yet let her go to a ball. Poor Ella! :)