Audrey and Nathan made a point of sneaking off to Derry for a night or two every couple of weeks since it was nearly impossible to have a relaxing evening in Haven with judgmental townspeople haranguing them wherever they went. Audrey had gotten somewhat used to that after shooting the Rev, but she saw how much it hurt Nathan every time someone blamed him for the town's misfortunes. In Derry they were blissfully anonymous. Audrey found it odd that people who lived less than thirty miles outside Haven could be completely oblivious to the happenings there, but she supposed Vince and Dave did their job well.

They tried different restaurants, but they always stayed in the bed and breakfast Audrey had discovered on their first date. It was a charming little place that abandoned the obvious seaside motif in favor of a rustic garden scheme. The rooms were cozy, the beds were comfortable, and the pancakes were served with homemade maple syrup – much to Nathan's delight.

It was his love for those pancakes that drew Audrey out of their room twenty minutes before the dining room closed. They'd gotten in around midnight and done nothing more than strip and sleep. For eight days straight they'd been working a particular nasty case: more than 100 people had come down with what was essentially a slow acting form of the plague. Thankfully only twelve people had succumbed before they found who was responsible and cajoled him into reversing the effects – but it had been touch and go the whole way and they hadn't slept more than four hours a night for a week. She had wanted to stick around town to get back to the neglected journals, but Nathan had insisted they take a proper break and she hadn't had the energy to argue with him.

More than nine hours of sleep later she still didn't. Instead of sitting across the table she took the seat next to his so she could lean her head against his shoulder. She was surely a sight – she'd tossed on the first thing in her suitcase and had barely taken the time to run a brush through her hair. Nathan looked quite rumpled himself, though less sluggish. He got pale when they worked too hard, which threw the shadows under his eyes into sharp contrast.

Right now those beautiful eyes of his were narrowed at her in consternation. "We shouldn't have gotten up," he said.

"You love these pancakes," she argued. There were so few good things in his life lately, she couldn't stand to deprive him of this one.

"Love you more." He was so earnest it made her slightly uncomfortable, even as her heart swelled. "And you look like death warmed over."

There was familiar territory – the back and forth they'd always done so effortlessly.

She wanted to tell him he didn't look so great either. Trouble was she couldn't do it. He always looked beautiful to her, even that night when she'd first come back from the Barn and he'd been an absolute train wreck. He could be drunk, depressed, or bleeding and he was still so damned handsome, all sharp symmetrical lines and miles of vibrant, pulsing man.

"We need to eat. Someone's always telling me that."

"Wise guy. But I think this time he might be wrong."

"Nah." But her authority was undermined by the yawn that shuddered through her. Embarassed, she nuzzled her head into his shoulder. He was a little bony; maybe she should get on his case about eating more. But he smelled good, and he was pleasantly warm and incontestably safe and that was wonderful in itself, crazy life that she led.

"Audrey." She could hear his concern, and she felt it as his long fingers, so clumsy and handicapped most of the time but so nimble against her skin, brushed a few strands of hair away from her face with utmost tenderness.

She looked up at him as his blue eyes watched her closely. "You don't have to worry about me." She put in the extra effort to enunciate clearly for his benefit. She wasn't sure why she was so wiped this time around, but she'd snap out of it. Always did. "I just need some coffee." She reached for the mug the waitress had brought her a few minutes ago, figuring it'd be cool enough, but Nathan got there first and covered it with his hand.

"Uh-uh."

"Now that's cruel," she pouted.

"No coffee for you. Soon as we eat you're going back to bed."

"I don't wanna waste your day off."

His lip twitched upward. "Hardly a hardship spending the day in bed with you."

For all his white knight chivalry, sometimes there could be a bit of a devil in Nathan Wuornos. And boy, how she loved it. She punched his shoulder, hard enough she knew he'd feel it through his sleeve. "Even if I'm passed out and snoring?"

"Sure. Sounds you make are more interesting than a symphony."

She flicked his neck and jerked away from him in indignation, but he snaked an arm around her shoulder and pulled her back, chuckling.

"We'll get up for dinner. And I'll give you a back rub."

His plan was sounding better by the minute. "Buy me a cupcake when we get home and you just may have a deal."

"Suppose I can spring for that."

The pancakes' arrival rejuvenated her a bit, but Nathan snatched her coffee out of reach and insisted the waitress bring her an orange juice instead. She debated arguing that the sugar in the syrup was sure to keep her up anyway, but she could tell he was truly worried under all his teasing and as much as she yearned for her caffeine fix it wasn't worth stressing him out over. Truth was a few more hours of sleep – or even just lazing in his arms – did seem mighty appealing. Who knew how many more chances they'd have for that.

They were nearly finished when they heard someone approach. Audrey expected it to be their waitress, but looked up to find Dorothy, the owner of the establishment. Audrey didn't remember ever having a grandmother, but Dorothy was exactly the type of woman every kid hoped for to fill that role – jovial, generous, full of interesting stories and clever as a whip. She ran the B&B with her two sons, and while they may have handled many of the business aspects she was clearly the boss. Nathan and Audrey were accustomed to lingering in the dining room or the window seat in the lobby, grateful for the freedom to be out in public without fear of reprisal, so they often found themselves chatting with the woman, who on more than one occasion had mentioned how nice it was to see young couples so in love, which always raised a delightful blush in Nathan's cheeks.

Today there seemed to be a bee in her bonnet. Her eyes were narrowed and one hand was planted on her hip, and for the first time ever Audrey saw her frown.

"Morning," Nathan greeted, but his tone faltered at the sight of her scowl.

Audrey sat up straight and tried not to look half-asleep. "How have you been?"

"I know I said you were always welcome here, pleasure to have polite young folks who actually look at each other and not the contraptions they're carrying. But the staff are beginning to talk. You show up in the middle of the night any day of the week, rarely any warning. This isn't that kind of place. You're a real pretty couple, and maybe you're meant to be, but I can't abide the thought of what you're leaving at home so you best not come around here any longer."

Audrey blinked at the unexpected tirade. She heard the words spilling from the woman's mouth, but they didn't make any sense. She turned to Nathan. "Maybe I'm just tired, but I have no idea what she just said."

"Not a Mainer yet," he remarked, and even though she thought they were probably supposed to look chastised he still seemed a little amused. "She thinks we're having an affair."

"Huh," she said with an amused huff of realization. "Oh no," she assured the woman, turning back to her. "Nathan's not allowed to sleep with anyone else. I have a gun."

Instead of relaxing the woman's eyes widened. "We're detectives with Haven PD," Nathan explained, using the slightly patronizing tone he adopted when he thought Audrey was being more socially clueless than he was. "We're not with anyone else."

"Is there a non-fraternization policy at the station?"

"No," Audrey answered at the same time Nathan said, "Well, yes."

She turned to him. "Maybe you want to take that off the books, Chief."

"It's a good rule. Mostly."

She rolled her eyes. "Never been too fond of rules."

"Hadn't noticed."

Dorothy cleared her throat and Audrey sobered. "Is that why you're sneaking around?"

Nathan reached for her hand and she squeezed back in solidarity. "We're not sneaking around. This isn't a secret back home."

Audrey could tell the woman needed further reassurance, so she took over. "Work's a bit – intense. It's hard to relax back home. We like to get away when we can. But we never know when we'll have a break in a case. If you don't want us to come here anymore we can find a new place."

Audrey wasn't used to caring about people's approval, but as the woman scrutinized her she found herself hoping she'd understand. Dorothy was one of the few people that didn't think her and Nathan's love was wrong, and she didn't want that to change.

Thankfully whatever track Dorothy's train of thought took it ended with a smile. "Of course you're welcome here, dears. I'm sorry about the accusation. In this day and age you start to see patterns. I can't abide the thought of my inn as a den of sin. But a lover's hideaway – the thoughts would make my Charles smile, if he were still around."

"Thank you," Audrey said earnestly.

"We'll try to check in earlier," Nathan offered.

"Nonsense. Crime doesn't consult people's schedules. I'll give my staff a standing order to watch out for you – and tell them to hold their tongues."

Having witnessed her displeasure firsthand, Audrey figured her staff would do almost anything to avoid it. There was no need to worry about gossip now.

"One small piece of advice – since I have already been quite bold today."

"Hmmm?" Nathan hummed.

"If you're going to keep a lady up all night, it's good manners to at least let her sleep in afterwards."

Nathan blushed scarlet, and Audrey dissolved into gut-wrenching laughter.

"Enjoy the rest of your stay, dears," Dorothy said with a twinkle in her eye before leaving the two of them alone.

"Oh my God." Audrey leaned against his shoulder and wiped the tears from her eyes.

"You're the one who set the alarm," Nathan protested.

"You are never going to live this down."

"It's not that funny," he grumbled.

"I know, but I'm so tired." She looked up at him with her best feigned innocence. "Cause you're wearing me out, and all."

"That a challenge?" His voice had dropped, and his sudden seriousness rippled through her.

"Absolutely."

Twenty minutes later, curled back up in bed, she still couldn't contain her snickers, not until he climbed on top of her and gave her reason to go back to sleep.

They woke again around dinner time and headed into town. The man at the front desk had handed them a flyer for Derry's Spring Fling when they checked in, and Nathan was excited to take her to her first New England carnival. They ate fried dough and fried green beans – "Almost makes eating vegetables worth it," she told him, "except these are kind of disgusting" – and he took her up on the Ferris wheel to watch the sun set over the ocean. Derry was a sleepy town compared to Haven – about a thousand more people but far less Trouble – and as she gazed at nearly all of it from her perch she realized as much as she enjoyed their time there together, it wasn't home.

Afterwards he presented her with a stuffed dolphin from one of the carnival stands, but the dog she won him at the shooting game was three times its size. He took it on the bumper cars with him and pretended it was driving, and she realized this was another side of Nathan she'd never seen – the goof. They had been living together for months and he still surprised her sometimes.

They stayed for the fireworks, and then went back to their room to make their own. Nathan built a fire in the fireplace and then they made love slowly, taking the time they hadn't been afforded the past eight days. He drained the tension from her body, knowing exactly what to do to leave her sated and boneless, her skin still faintly humming from his adoration. She rolled on her side to watch the flames in the hearth, but reached back to drape his arm across her stomach.

"I've been thinking," Nathan told her, his voice a few inches behind her ear.

"Now I'm worried," she teased.

The immediate rebuttal she expected did not come. When he answered there was no flippancy in his tone. "If we can't find another way to stop the Troubles before the Guard's deadline, I want you to kill me."

She spun toward him, her entire being – mind, soul and body – protesting his absurd request. "Have you lost your mind?"

He sounded serious, but also somewhat casual, as if he was asking her to make dinner every night that week instead of murder her soul mate. "It may be the only way—"

"Stop it! Stop it right now," she demanded. "I won't."

"Audrey, please. Least hear me out."

In the past three months she'd learned countless ways to make him beg in far more pleasurable situations. This was something else entirely, as if his very soul implored her to listen to something it could not keep contained. As much as she found the plan he proposed abhorrent, she respected him too much not to heed his request.

She would listen.

Wouldn't make any difference, though. There was no way she was killing him.

"Okay. Explain to me how you possibly think this could be a good idea."

"It's not a good idea. But it might be the only way."

"It's not the only way!"

He closed his eyes and grimaced. "Please, just let me finish. Then you can argue all you want."

It was hurting him to say this, she realized, as good as he was at projecting calm. She shouldn't make this any harder. "No more interrupting," she promised.

"Thank you."

His eyes were bright but his voice was steady. "We're going to keep trying to figure this out. But we've only got three months until our time is up. We need to consider the possibility that there isn't another option. The Barn is gone. The only other way we know to end the Troubles is for you to kill someone you love."

She squeezed his hand and clenched her teeth against the refusal bubbling up her throat like bile. The moment Howard had told her about her second option, she'd sworn to herself to die before she let that happen.

He raised his free hand to run it gently across her clenched jaw. "These last three months with you – despite everything happening in town – have been bliss. I never thought it was possible for me to be so happy. I want to spend the next sixty years by your side. But my happiness is built on others' suffering, and I can't ignore that any more. When I shot Howard I interrupted the cycle. So many innocents are still paying the price for that. I love you, but I can't live with that forever."

As much as she wanted to rage at him for daring to suggest such a thing, all she could do was ache at the injustice of it all. Because here was the just, noble man she'd fallen in love with, who'd chosen to retain his Trouble to free a stranger from hers. She could not fault him for the very trait she'd found so attractive.

That didn't mean she could do what he asked.

"I get it. But you couldn't let me go into the Barn. What makes you think I could kill you?" Her voice cracked, and as much as she tried to keep the tears at bay for both of them they fell, warm and unwanted, down her check.

He wiped them away with infinite tenderness, and then pushed her hair back behind her ear. "You're stronger than me. Always have been. Even when I was a kid you were holding me together."

But she could not look at this man, who had born so much on his shoulders for so long without complaint, and see anything but strength.

She reached out to trace his features, to run her fingers across his lips and his eyebrows and his cheekbones, suddenly desperate to commit it all to muscle memory just in case – God, just in case. The thought of not being able to do this anymore made her cry again, terrible burning, honest tears.

"I've been alone all my life. All my lives. I don't want to feel that way anymore. Maybe I'd survive. But I'd never get over you."

He surged forward, pressing his forehead against hers and holding her there, his hands warm on both sides of her face.

"I don't want to leave you alone. The thought of that – it practically kills me, right here and now. But it's better than the alternative. The Guard will kill you. And James and Duke. Possibly others, too."

She gulped, because she knew what else he was thinking, and it was the worst part of all. "But not you."

"I don't think so. They know it would hurt worse to keep me alive." He closed his eyes and took a deep breath that shuddered through him. Audrey couldn't help but think of a death rattle, and the sudden nausea was so strong she almost gagged. "They're right."

She threw her arms around him, threading one hand through his hair and running the other down his back, needing to ground them both in this moment where they were both still alive and together.

He spoke into her shoulder. "I can't live with that pain again. Not if they make me watch while they take away everything I love, knowing I could have stopped it. And it would be for nothing. Killing you won't end the Troubles, I know it. This whole town would be damned forever."

In that terrible instant she thought it would serve them right. She was shocked by her hatred toward the place she had always worked so hard to protect.

Haven was home. But Nathan was the only thing she needed.

"If you kill me only one life has to be lost. So many will be saved. At least it'll mean something. And you won't be alone. Duke will look after you."

She pulled away, unable to trust her ears. What a time for Nathan to make a joke. But his face was earnest. "I can't believe you're trusting Duke to look after me."

"He loves you." She realized he must have contemplated this plan for a long time to come to terms with leaving her to a lifetime with Duke.

But all possibilities of a relationship with the criminal with a heart of gold had sailed when she'd fallen for her partner. Duke was a dear friend, and there had definitely been moments of attraction between them. But she could never be with him that way after what she had shared with Nathan. It would be a betrayal of the worst kind, even if she had Nathan's blessing. And it wouldn't be any fairer to Duke than it would be to Nathan's memory.

"I don't want him. I want you," she swore.

"Good to know." There was a touch of self-satisfaction in his tone that shouldn't have been necessary; he never should have doubted that, but she'd spent too long playing with both their affections.

Was this her punishment? she wondered. She had not loved him well enough, and now she'd have to kill him.

He braced his hands on her arms. "I need you to promise me, Audrey."

She shook her head. "I'm not giving up! We have three months. We'll keep looking. There are still all of Eleanor's journals and –"

"Course we'll keep looking. Soon as we find a better plan I'll be all for it. But if we don't—"

"Last resort. It's just a last resort. It's not the plan. The plan is to find another way."

Their eyes met, and she knew he was wrong. He was stronger than she was. At least in this. "Okay."

"I'm only agreeing because I can't bear the thought of you suffering alone. And because we can't let them kill James."

He nodded. "It'll be all right as long as you're with me at the end. After six months with you I'll die a happy man."

She closed her eyes against the wave of misery she felt at hearing him mention his own death so casually. Her stomach churned so fiercely she didn't know how she'd be able to eat for the next three months.

"You've been buttering me up all day," she deduced. "The sleep and the carnival and the sex."

He glanced up at her shyly. "Are you mad?"

"No. Yes." She heaved a deep sigh. "Not at you."

"I wanted to give you a normal day."

"It was wonderful." He was always going out of his way to look after her, while she was constantly distracted by the lives they lived and the curse she'd somehow brought on Haven.

"I'm sorry I teased you about what Dorothy said."

He shook his head. "Don't ever apologize for being you. I expect you to keep on teasing me. Right until the end."

"This isn't going to end this way," she swore. "This is my curse, and I won't let you be its victim."

"If there's anyone stubborn and smart enough to stop this, it's you. I'm not worried."

She wished she had the same confidence. She'd move heaven and earth to keep him safe, but the last time they were up against a clock hadn't turned out so well.

Whatever came to pass, she'd make the most of the time they were given.

Starting with tonight. She pushed him back against the mattress and kissed him until neither of them could breathe, her hands charting a frantic, desperate course across his body that made him shiver beneath her.

"Audrey," he gasped as she went to work on his neck, scraping her teeth against his jugular where his pulse pounded.

"Shut up." She ran a hand up his thigh and then ground down on him to give him the friction he craved. "Just touch me."

She could cry after he was gone.

So sorry for the delay, guys! The season four plots bunnies bit hard, and I've written a number of post-eps for the past few episodes. Please check them out if you're looking for some more Nathan/Audrey goodness. I'm quite pleased with them. Season four is such a fun sandbox to play in … much less aggravating than season three!

This chapter was actually planned, and a good deal of it written, before this very issue became such a major canon plot point. I've been writing a lot about it in the context of season four, so I hope this doesn't feel rehashed. Nathan and Audrey are dealing with it from much more stable footing in this fic, and interestingly enough here it's Audrey who made the deal with the Guard, not Nathan. I'm still amused by all the things I guessed correctly when I was speculating between seasons.

As always, I love to hear what you think. Thanks for sticking with me!