House keeping!

First of all, sorry for the delay in posting. Back to school season is always hectic and my university courses are being fairly demanding, so posting and proof-reading are not going very well. Luckily this story is almost done so soon I won't have to worry about updating for a while.

Second, I've had to add a few extra chapters because in my usual fashion I have too much to say and not enough time to say it. So, that's exciting!

Finally, I would like to confirm: Ash and Lillian will return for their trip to Mineral Town. No title to be released yet, but expect that story around the beginning of 2015. Date may be bumped up sooner depending on interest, both yours and mine.

Now, on with the story!

He tactfully avoided Lillian's eye as he helped her into her coat, waving goodnight to his mother and Cheryl as they turned towards the door. "I won't be long, just going to walk her home. Cheryl, help Mom with the dishes and be in bed before I'm back."

He shut the door on their replies, leaning against the ancient wood and looking a little warily at his company. She had been quiet for the majority of the evening, occasionally drifting out of conversation to glare at him across the table, but he supposed he should be thankful nothing worse had happened. She was shivering slightly, up to her ankles in snow and staring at him as if she was trying to decide the best way to throttle him. He closed his eyes, not wanting to look at her when she finally started yelling at him. "Alright. Say it." He shoved his hands into his pockets and braced himself.

"I can't believe you did this to us.

He allowed the words to settle between them, a bit surprised at the sudden flicker of emotion running through him. But he had known what he had been doing from the moment he opened his mouth to tell his mother the news, knew he would be binding himself to Lillian in a way that only vows could make stronger. He knew it was selfish, when she so clearly wasn't ready… But he was. Regardless of when she settled, he would want her, would spend his whole life convincing her if he had to. She was like a drug to him, a sickly sweet lavender that kept him coming back for more…

"I know." He said slowly, shifting his weight until he propped himself up against the door. He hesitated for a moment, trying to find her face in the failing evening light. "I'm sorry."

She remained silent, shivering still, and he found the urge to run to her side and hold her being replaced by frustration. She had known what she wanted in the barn, and she had admitted-maybe a little unwillingly- that she wanted to be with him. So what was the point in waiting? Why bother wasting any more of their lives pretending, skirting around the inevitable… He felt his jaw clench. "You know… I was straight with you from the moment I said it. What more do you want? I thought we were past this- I told you I wanted to marry you and I meant it. Sometimes… Sometimes I feel like it's you who's hiding things, Lillian."

She still wouldn't look at him, and at once he felt that same hatred for her that he had felt all those weeks ago. He was so tired of her, of her mind games. "Tell me, then!" He shouted hoarsely. "What are you hiding? What are you too afraid to say to me?"

She grimaced as he yelled, a tiny shiver sending her teeth chattering. For once she looked as tired as he was, not bothering to rise to an invitation to a fight. "I'm not hiding anything." She said evenly.

He let out a ragged breath and glared at her as it misted up in front of his face. "Yes you are. Tell me!"

She was beginning to lose herself, whatever resolve she had made not to fight beginning to crumble under his picking. "I don't have to tell you anything!" She hissed.

He laughed, the noise sounding alarming and unfamiliar in his own ear, and took a furious step towards her, the toes of his boots splashing snow onto her calves. "Oh yeah? I'm as good as your husband! I command you-"

"Command!" She repeated, her cheeks flooding crimson. "Hell will freeze over when you get to command anything from me!" She shrieked.

They glared at each other, nearly a foot apart, their breath enshrouding them in a haze of fog. He kept his eyes locked on hers, willing the familiarity of her hazel orbs to soothe him. At last he drew a ragged breath and reached for her, ignoring her resistance as he fitted her head beneath his jaw. "Okay. I'm sorry. That was a stupid thing to say." He said quietly, smoothing her hair against her head. "It's not my place to make you do anything, you're right. I'm sorry."

She was stiff for a moment before she relaxed slightly. "Sometimes I miss the old days." She said against his coat. "When it was just us two and nobody else to make things complicated."

"You have a point."

She pulled back slightly at his frustrated tone, stepping back until she could see his eyes. "Alright, say it." She said sternly, ignoring his confused frown. "I know you have something else to say, and I'm not going to pretend either of us think this fight is over. So say it."

He hesitated long enough for her to prod his foot with the end of her boot. "Honesty, was it?" She repeated their usual saying, ducking her head and sending him a wry look.

He nearly laughed again; long were the days when she couldn't tell what he was thinking, when she would misread his face. He drew a breath and lost himself, the words so easily forming in his head not translating on his tongue, and before he could catch himself he felt them tumble past his lips, his temper rising as she continued to smirk at him. "You know, sometimes the things you say are awful." He said loudly, shoving his fists into his pockets. She dropped her gaze to her feet and allowed her hair to hide her from him, her boots scraping the snow off the tops of her feet. "They are, Lillian. I don't know who taught you how to be like this- it stops now, okay? I'm here, putting my heart on the fucking line for you. I don't get it, why are you pretending not to feel the way I do? Even if you just feel a fraction of it... It's not fair, Lillian. It's not fair for me to always be the one to... I don't know who hurt you or taught you that this is okay, but it isn't. I love you, you love me, that's it. That's the end of it. And regardless of how much you deny it I don't believe for a second that you don't want me. And sometimes I feel like I've spent the past year telling you all about myself and I don't know a damned thing about you." He drew breath and suddenly found himself yelling again, his voice ringing out in the silence of the night as he advanced on her, fighting against the urge to grab her and shake her. "I am so sick of not having you figured out. Why? Why do you always push me away? Haven't I already told you, I'm not leaving! Stop being so bloody cruel and determined to scare me away. I'm not leaving."

He was less than a foot away from her now, stooped slightly. "Who taught you to be so fucking cold, anyway?"

She jerked her head up to meet his gaze, and to his satisfaction he saw tears in her eyes- as much as he hated seeing her in pain he felt a sort of sick relish in knowing that he had hurt her, that he had made her feel as miserable as she had made him feel, even if it did make his stomach churn and bile rise in his throat. "If you don't like it you can leave, Ash." She whispered, blinking rapidly up at him.

"Don't you get it?" He hissed, trying to keep his hands gentle as he grasped her about the elbows. "I can't leave. Not now."

"Why?"

"Why?" He burst out, trying not to shake her. "Why? Because I love you, Lillian!" She closed her eyes at the word as if he had said something vulgar, her fists balling at the front of his coat. "This is love, Lillian! Don't you get it?I, I need you, Lillian. If I'm not with you-" He felt his throat catch as he pulled her against him, his face burying into her neck.

She was limp in his arms, balancing against him on the tips of her toes. "You must really love me." She said quietly, her hands slowly creeping up to his neck. "If you're willing to go through with this. With me being the way I am…"

"I do." He said slowly, pulling back enough to look her full on in the face. "I'm selfish, Lillian. But if you love me, even a little… Please. I'll convince you to love me like I love you. Please." Her lower lip trembled slightly before she leant up to press her lips against his. "Is this a yes?" He whispered against her lips.

"It's an okay." She whispered back, the ends of her eyelashes tickling his cheek as she pulled away, settling back properly onto her feet. "It's an, 'I'll try.' I'm not… I'm not good at these kind of things, you know that. But I'm willing to try. Because- Because I love you, okay?"

"Okay." He grinned, tightening his grip about her waist and pulling her against his chest. "Okay, I can work with that."

She hesitated for a moment, her teeth worrying her lower lip. "When you're in Mineral Town… You're there for me, okay? You're there to help me and- and you're not there for your mother, or anything else other people might expect of you, alright? I don't want this trip to be something that gets ruined by marriage talk, or, or any other pretend things, okay? What's there is real."

"Pretend?" He pulled back slightly. "Lillian- you don't think… You know that this thing about me wanting to get married… It's not pretend. Not to me. I want you, Lillian. I want you to be my wife. If you love me, you'll know that."

She closed her eyes. "I know. I know it's real to you, okay? It's just- not real to me. Not yet. It might be, one day. I don't know." She opened her eyes, biting her lip again. "Sometimes I think… I think I'm just part of some plan you worked up. You come with me to Mineral Town, you get out of this godforsaken village, even if just for a little while-"

He felt himself go slightly white, pushing her back until he could look her in the face properly. "You think I'm using you?" He felt his stomach churn; no, no, that was never his intention. Certainly, the chance to get out of Bluebell was a great bonus but- no. "How could you even say that? Don't you realize- Lillian, I'm coming for you. I'm coming because I can't be without you, and because I'm pretty sure you can't be without me. Look at how we managed these past few weeks, how are we going to manage the next month? I can't even- thinking about you alone-" He swallowed thickly. "I can't do it Lillian. I love you, I can't."

She looked up at him through her lashes, her fingers reaching out to fiddle with a button on his coat. "Okay." She said quietly, keeping her eyes on the button. "Okay, you're right... I want you to tell Laney though." He opened his mouth to speak but she cut him off, her voice cracking slightly with stress. "I know I haven't been easy on you, okay? But… Just tell her. If it were me, waiting to hear from the man I… Loved, I would want to hear it from him instead of watching him run off, not knowing." She look up at him, trying to smile. "She's supposed to be the other great love of your life, isn't she? Don't you think that deserves a proper goodbye?"

He felt himself fail under her gaze and nodded, reaching for her. "I know. You're right." He pulled her against his chest once more, trying to find comfort in her scent.

She sighed against him, turning her head until her lips were brushing against his neck. "This is the last one." She breathed.

"The last what?"

"Fight." She pulled back, pressing the tips of her fingers against his chest and prodding him towards Howard's Café. "I'm tired of hating you."

He took a few steps backwards but didn't drop his gaze. "You really think so? You really think you can stop?"

"No." She said quietly, stooping slightly to smooth her dress against her legs. "But I'm trying."

Because that was what love was to her, he didn't know why it made sense now more so than before, but it did. He watched her walk towards her ranch until the darkness swallowed her whole, thinking. She was hard as ice, and about as cold. But she would melt for him. She hated that he could make her feel something, that he could light her on fire with all the rage in the world, and it was love because all that hate came from all the raw emotion inside of her, the emotion he nor any other man could tame… She was fire and he was brittle summer grass. And he would let her consume him in heat, and be thankful that that heat meant something to the both of them.

I live for angst with these two. Their relationship is awful; good thing the sex is good.

I've been fussing over the next chapter but hopefully it will meet my standards in a few days, no more than a week. As this fic is coming to a close, please feel free to leave any requests for one-shots or the like in with your reviews.