Author's Note:

This scene revealed itself to me in a dream, and I just had to write it out despite that it doesn't actually belong in "Liberation" and instead would go into the prequel if I get around to writing that. But for those who are enjoying the romance with Hunter and wanted to hear more about how his relationship with Aleksandrya progressed then it's here for your (and my!) enjoyment. It's a good foundational scene, along with the subsequent chapter of Hunter talking to Melnik about her, that way you as the reader understand the motivations behind Aleks' feelings and actions during Liberation.

One Year Before the Beginning of "Liberation"
Year 2032

When the enigmatic and intimidating Stalker returned to Novokuznetskaya, the whispers of his presence reached her before he did. She was already waiting for him in the usual place - next to the train car at the edge of the right-hand tunnel, in her full battle dress with her rifle slung over her shoulder. He paused and smiled, because she hadn't seen him coming yet, still concealed in the crowd of pedestrians weaving in and out of the square marble archway that separated them.

Hunter didn't want to admit, even to himself, that he had missed being in her company, though that strange and subtle void inside him seemed to heal when she was around. It had been almost two whole weeks since he had last seen her, leaving her on the dock in Venice when he had to take the boat north to get back to Polis. How he had stood there and watched her thin form recede into a blur and wished that she was on the boat next to him. He had fancied in his meditations a time where they didn't have to meet and part constantly and that the tables were turned in reverse; that being with her was the normal order of things and only occasionally would he have to leave her side for a day or two.

He hadn't been bold enough yet in real life to suggest that she give up her citizenship or abandon her group of friends and fellow refugees which was quickly becoming a clan by rights, though he'd had those conversations in his own mind a few times. Her group worked currently as mercenaries for the defense commander at Novokuznetskaya, making sure that no errant criminals or other undesirables from Venice remained in the vicinity for more than twenty-four hours – a job that Hunter had helped her secure. This last bastion of her careful planning and intelligence gathering was all that kept Novokuznetskaya from becoming another annexation of the organized crime syndicates. He felt genuine pride for her, and not just because a good part of her ability for leadership and tactical planning was in recognition of his careful teaching, but because she had interwoven those lessons with her own guile and truly excelled at it.

As he watched her now, she had leaned back against the faded blue metal body of the train comfortably, studying her fingernails momentarily and then perked her head up and looked around. Knowing that she had sensed his gaze on her, he tried to quickly hide his sentimental smile and took in a deep breath in preparation for the impending conversation; stepping through the archway crowded with residents, he greeted her in the quiet corner.

"Hey Aleks," he said almost sheepishly, not looking directly into her eyes.

"Hi, Hunter. So, what will it be this time?" She asked immediately and with excited smile, wanting a hint as to the day's activities per usual. Though she always came prepared for anything, he warned when there would be special circumstances in their mission just to be sure she had a gas mask or extra ammunition.

"We'll go to the abandoned transfer tunnel towards Polyanka." He motioned behind him vaguely with one hand.

"Is it true that there's gas there?" She eyed him suspiciously, shifting herself upright and picking up her small rucksack from the floor.

"Well we aren't going into the station, there's a depot halfway, a quiet spot we can practice in." He reported sternly, knowing that she had only been probing him for further clues about what the actual lesson would be but even he wasn't quite sure yet what it would entail. He was quickly running out of ideas for anything new and relevant to show her, as they'd been exploring tunnels and practicing their skills for well over a year now. She hadn't needed too much instruction anyway, as her intuition proved to be her greatest talent; with only a simple explanation to go off of, she fulfilled his parameters to the fullest extent and still impressed him each time with her genuine passion for doing so. Only by adding to her ability to travel and inserting more technical knowledge into their activities enabled him to keep the title of mentor, as he had also learned a lot from her when he hadn't been expecting to.

"Someday I'd like to go there; people say you can see your destiny – that it shows you things, impossible things." She regaled while walking along beside him as he led the way through the main hall that was dotted with spiked lanterns in the middle of the patterned tile floor. "Some people see the world from before, other people see the future."

"Most of them are just liars and idiots." He mocked, trying to control his tone of voice somewhere between amusement and arrogance. "Anybody who would go there looking for that shit is, anyway."

"And you've been there before, I take it? Don't answer – of course you have. So what did you see?" She probed with an eyebrow raised, grabbing at his sleeve incessantly as if she wouldn't let go until he told her some fantastical tale.

"Nothing at all. If you've got your wits about you and you don't give in to stupid fantasies, you can go through there just fine." He growled, suddenly tiring of her childish fixation on the station.

"Well, I'm not afraid of it. I'm not afraid of destiny." She said with a sly and confident smile, looking over at him but not losing step, wanting to ask him about his fears and his destiny.

"Are you afraid of anything, then?" He asked incredulously and the smile reappeared against his will, and feeling as though they had already had this conversation once, he tried to think back on it.

"I try not to think about fear." She said uncertainly, finally releasing her grasp on his arm and crossing her own across her chest. "I'm only afraid of the things I don't know about yet."

"That's very wise." He replied quietly and remained silent afterwards. Aleks didn't try to initiate any further conversation after they stepped off the platform and entered the dark and damp tunnel.

They walked along at a brisk and confident pace in the direction of the Circle Line for twenty minutes, and Aleks had looked over at Hunter every few steps, wondering what he was thinking about because he hadn't spoken a word since the conversation about Polyanka. He had seemed somehow irritated and she wondered what he had been up to before he appeared at Novokuznetskaya. Had something happened somewhere else in the Metro that warranted concern? Should she ask him about it? Maybe he was just tired from a long journey? It's not that she was unused to his taciturn personality but it sometimes struck her as strange because there were other times where he was quite loquacious – often asking her about her work at the station, what intel she had gathered, and even how her comrades were doing. In a way, she recognized that she was also one of his informants, and smiled proudly at the thought that she was assisting The Order, even just by helping defend one small station and keeping a keen ear out for rumors. She chalked up his silence to instinct, as he could sense things in the tunnels that normal people couldn't, and his hearing was excellent. There were even times she could swear that he heard her thoughts, and upon that remembrance, tried to silence her suspicions.

This southbound tunnel became cleaner and drier as they went along, and Aleks knew that it was only due to the Hanza patrols and the incline of the tracks which left the waters of Venice behind them. Beyond the transfer to the Hanza territory, she had heard of the Pavelets station but didn't know much about it. She was intending to ask Hunter what lay further along the Zamoskvoretskaya line but he was already calling her over to the side of the tracks in a seemingly random location. In the pitch darkness was a hallway, barely noticeable even with her flashlight pointing right towards it – recessed into a depression between the tunnel liners, as if one section had melted away and opened up a corridor right into the bowels of the Earth.

"This will get us past the blockage," he said quietly, and she understood that the actual tunnel connections were collapsed or demolished, probably by Hanza, and that this was the only way through.

Murmuring her response of understanding, he disappeared into the space past the open door and she hurried to follow. In the first room there was an electric box humming to keep the red emergency lights glowing and rusted metal shelving around the perimeter. Three doors connected to the room, one on each side, and Hunter knew just which one led onwards to their destination, opening it without hesitating for a second.

In the next hall the air duct in the ceiling was spilling out brownish water which was running down the concrete floor in the opposite direction and disappeared through a grate in the floor. Hunter had stopped, coming to terms with the fact that there was no other way but to duck through the water to get to the other side. He had already begun removing his body armor as Aleks took the rifle off her shoulder and jumped straight through the torrent, holding the weapon out to the side so it would not get wet. He chuckled quietly at her disgusted grumbling, evidently the water was cold. Finishing the task of undressing by removing his uniform top and bundling it under one arm with his armor, he dashed through the stream in one leap, the rusty water drenching his undershirt over one shoulder and partly down his back.

Aleks was still shaking herself off on the other side, bent over and unraveling her hair from the plastic clip she used to pile it up behind her head. The reddish brown strands had grown several more inches since the last time he had seen her with her hair down, and he watched silently as she wrung it out as best she could before twisting it up into the clip again. Catching his glance as she finished, he tried to pretend that she wasn't his focus, gesturing further down the hall to direct her attention onwards. With half a smile she took up her weapon from the floor and obeyed, leading the way to the end of the hall and out into the abandoned tunnel.

Drawing even with her and falling into step again, silence prevailed as they walked for another ten minutes. This tunnel was eerily silent, but not in a foreboding way, it just seemed so devoid of activity compared to the hustle and bustle of the station they had just come from. Hunter had not passed through this way in a long while, as he was afforded transit through Hanza and the other confederations by rank and title. But with Aleks there was always a need to find secluded places so that he could focus and they wouldn't be disturbed. Sometimes he wished that there didn't need to be a lesson or mission involved, and that he could just come see her as respite from his other tasks. Why not just sit comfortably in a tent and read a book to her? She seemed to enjoy the last one he had brought, a novel by Ivan Turgenev that he had read way back in his school days. But she had a genuine interest in these excursions, especially when he hazarded taking her along with him on his ordered patrols and even sometimes to the surface outposts. He didn't know how she would react if he dared suggest that they simply sat around and did nothing at all.

They came to a small way station with a narrow concrete platform and two rows of metal columns. Clearly people had congregated here once, as the tracks had several crates and other debris piled up against the tunnel walls. It looked more like a dumping ground than a station. Setting down his armor and uniform top on the edge of the platform, he climbed up in search of the circuit breaker. He flipped it on a minute later and two dim bulbs flickered to life, giving just enough ambient light to see the contours of the dismal architecture, at the very least eliminating the danger of tripping over the random garbage that was strewn about the area.

"Alright, here is good. It's quiet." He spoke curtly, dragging a wooden box into the middle of the platform and then turned to her slowly as he was still coming up with a plan. "Give me your bandana for a minute."

"What for?" She asked, though she didn't hesitate to obey his command, undoing the knot of the loose fabric around her neck with one finger and handing it to him before setting down her rucksack and rifle next to his things.

"I want you to sit here in the middle, cover your ears and give me time to pick a location." He folded the triangle of cloth downwards so it formed a narrow band. "Then I'm going to try to reach you as silently as I can and you see if you can tell where I'm coming from. Got that?"

"Sure, that's easy," she said with a smirk but as if trying to convince herself.

"Sit. Here." He commanded gently, and began tying the cloth over her eyes after she had taken her position.

Aleks took a breath and settled herself both physically and mentally, spreading out her feet and placing both hands beside her, sitting up tall with her shoulders straight. She let in a rush of sound, trying to assimilate the slight chorus of ambient noise in this little waystation; there was a very slight wind whistling in the right hand tunnel, a pipe dripped distantly, and there was the quiet scratching of rats along the walls.

"Now cover your ears, count to ten, and then I will begin." He said, taking a step backwards.

She obliged his instructions and covered her ears with her hands, and then in a moderate tone she began counting down. As soon as she had spoken, Hunter ran to the side, her back right corner, and pushed up against the grimy wall. As she continued to count, he took three large steps to the right, so he was seeing her in profile.

"Четыре… три… два… один." She sounded out, and then very slowly and carefully lowered her hands, though didn't replace them on the box, leaving them held out to the side.

Now it was on, and he quickly decided his approach, taking note of several puddles on the ground and some concrete rubble next to her right foot. He took a step and then suddenly wondered how nimble he should be. Would it be best to try his absolute hardest to be completely silent in his approach? Or should he start out a bit clumsily and give her some confidence first? Another cautious step, and he was still stuck on the decision, though he certainly didn't want to baby her in any way – she had been more than willing and capable of his assignments. No, he would give it his all, and if she could pick up on his motions, it would prove either that he was a good teacher or had begun to lose his touch.

She jerked her head in his direction, craning and stretching her neck, trying to flatten her ear to his exact location in order to take in as much of the muted sounds as possible. He caught his breath in his chest, holding himself still for a few tense seconds to throw her off the trail. Daring to take a wide step to his left, there was a slight click as his boot had come down on the very edge of a puddle.

"On the right." She said softly, lowering her chin and waiting for him to admit that he had been discovered.

"Very good. I'll have to try harder, then." He chuckled softly, though he would normally have been angry with himself, in the end it was also a game of wits, and he was having fun. Satisfied that he had chosen not only a low-energy test but also apparently an enjoyable one, he took in a satisfied breath and just admired her tenacity.

"десять… девять…" She had wasted no time in restarting the clock.

Awed and impressed with her eagerness to continue, he quickly dashed to the other side of her and then to the right and down the platform. Circling around one of the far columns, he decided to take a direct approach this time.

"шесть… пять…" She sounded in a light voice that echoed along the concrete floor.

He watched and listened to her carefully, already planning his approach and scanning his eyes along the dimly lit floor for obstacles that would give him away. Aside from some kind of spent canisters on the left, the path in the exact middle of the platform was clear; no puddles or piles of plaster or concrete.

When she finished the countdown and removed her hands from her ears, he started forward. This time, he would run out the nonexistent clock; even though the path was clear, he also wanted to test her patience. How long would she wait in silence before she began to second-guess herself? Would she become agitated and start calling out directions where she could hear the rumblings and echoes of ambient existence in other parts of the station? Could she discern human movement from the light breezes gushing through the tunnels on either side?

He counted his own ten seconds and then took a step forward, angling his foot to steady himself in a wide stance, remaining in between steps as he counted again. Ten more seconds, a step, ten more, a step, twenty, thirty, forty-five seconds. Now a full minute had passed and he had closed half the distance, and Aleks had not moved a muscle. Her fingertips touched the edge of the crate gently, and her body was held stiffly as if some electric charge was running through her from the floor. Thirty more seconds passed and he found himself no more than four feet from her, had she really not heard or sensed anything so far? Or was she now toying with him, too?

Holding his breath and tenderly taking another step forward until he was crouched just one foot from her, he began studying her face for any kind of clues as to what she was thinking. Unable to discern a single hint from the features he could see, he began to tune in to other senses. The air here was humid and her sweet scent permeated it; the deep earthy smell of the charcoal soap she used, the tart aroma of rusted metal in her hair that was still damp, the musk of her handmade leather vest. Caught up in the symphony, he hadn't yet noticed the ever-so-slight smile pulling at the corners of her pale pink lips.

A hand was slowly rising into the air; her right hand hovered warily halfway between them, her fingers gently stretching outwards and searching. He was completely stunned as her fingertips grazed against his forehead timidly, then gently flattened as she confirmed her target and combed through his short dark hair – sending a shiver like a spark of electricity down his spine. It was then that he noticed her smile as it grew, mischievous, satisfied, and she had left her hand against him, forbidding his tongue from forming any words.

"My turn." She said softly, finally moving her hand away to untie the bandana.

He was about to speak, although he didn't really know what to say, but she was already audaciously wrapping the cloth around his head, tying the ends in the back and staring into his eyes momentarily.

"Alright," he managed to say as she stepped aside and he took her place on the box and lowered the bandana over his eyes. He took a deep breath, trying to remember exactly what the lesson was supposed to be about.

"Well, count for us then." She said in a teasing voice from somewhere on his left.

"десять… девять…" He sounded off dully, almost forgetting to cover his ears until he was already two numbers in. Why was he suddenly so distracted?

He finished the countdown and quickly lowered his hands, blocking out the swishing sound of his t-shirt as he settled. The wind in the tunnel had subsided momentarily, there was a pipe dripping at uneven times, and there was a small creature scurrying along the floor on the left. His heart pounded in his ears. Calm, he had to remain calm, block out everything else. There! The rubble on the floor had given her away, but she had gotten close in just that short amount of time.

"From behind." He stated a little too loudly. Hearing her disappointed huff, he switched gears and said in a softer tone. "It's okay. Try again."

Hunter had restarted the numbers and Aleks instantly decided to dance in a quick circle around him. Not for just any reason, but she thought that passing close by him on all sides would confuse him enough so that she would have more time to think. In the nanoseconds between his words, she made sure he could hear her boots scrape against the concrete purposefully and slapped her hands loudly on a column as she swung around it. Then he was almost at the end and she darted over to the side, ending up on his front left and watching him hunch his head down to listen for her once he had fallen silent.

She carefully planned her route, with the only real problem being the slight incline from the tracks up to the concrete lip of the platform as her momentum had carried her off the edge. Being careful to only step wholly on the wooden crosstie and not into its rocky foundation, she began her approach. Only in placing the arch of her foot onto the corner of the platform at an angle could ensure that no sound was made, it had the least amount of surface area and the thickest remaining rubber in the sole, and her instincts proved her right as she climbed the step and paused. He had turned his head slightly, first towards one side of the space and then the other; each time he showed the tiniest fraction of a movement she stopped dead and held in her breath. This time, she would not fail. This time she would get within an inch of him, was it possible?

Another three steps brought her within five feet of the intimidating figure, and she studied his magnificently sculpted arms for a solid minute just out of admiration – he didn't normally wear short sleeves. If Hunter could hear almost everything, sense invisible wavelengths in the tunnels, and predict danger, then he couldn't possibly still be oblivious to her affectionate interest. The subtle gestures, slight smiles, and the plucky confidence she tried to exude in order to receive his confidence in return had kept the status quo. But something else had been building besides a mere partnership of skill. In the months that had gone by since he had taken her to live in Novokuznetskaya, she found that he consumed more and more of her thoughts with each visit. Where at first she would think of their lessons for a few hours after he had parted from her company and then go on with her day back at the station until he randomly appeared again, soon she had found herself imagining the next time they would meet. After their next few reunions she began to suspect that he had some kind of similar interest in her as well; how else could she explain why he kept traveling out of his way repeatedly, taking precious time out of his assignments to spend with her. When he spoke candidly, she always had the suspicious feeling that he didn't talk as much with anyone else, and the slight smirk constantly fixed on his lips during it all had confirmed enough for her. She was certainly not immune to any amount of his charm, though he had nearly exasperated every ounce of it to hook her interest in the first place. But even after she had agreed to his proposition to become partners and exchange secrets, he still radiated his undeniable magnetism anyway. Just to keep her interested in their strange partnership? Or to grow their bond into something more than that? Her only answer lay in the multitude of quick glances and half-displayed expressions she had caught him in, and the noted difference in his voice and behavior between when they were in the midst of something serious, and when their conversations gave way to playful banter and hinted emotions. For certain, he had to have noticed it all, too. And maybe he just didn't know how to proceed.

Finally, she shook herself out from the rabbit hole of wishful thinking, wondering how much time had actually passed while she had been daydreaming. A quick study informed her that he had not moved or given up on the game, and she guessed that at least two or three minutes had passed while she had just been staring at him sitting there. Suddenly she came to a conclusion, and made a decision – to test him the same way he had been testing her. It was time to find out exactly how he felt. Tracing her gaze upwards, her crosshairs fell on her target, and she searched for her next step. A pause, and she slowly let out her breath through her nose and took in another, the last one she would need to reach her goal.

With nothing but whispers reaching his ears, he could only guess at the amount of time that had passed. Serves him right for trying to make her wait as he had during his last attempt, and he still couldn't decide if he had passed or failed. Had she sensed him coming and simply didn't object? Was she even taking the task seriously? Would she still have reached out like that if he hadn't been there right in front of her? Maybe she had smelled something of him as well, at the same moment he was admiring her alluring aroma.

His head wavered slightly, as he had begun to shake off those thoughts, but then he straightened up again. Was that a footstep? A rustle? He had to focus, at any minute she could sneak up and – would she reach out and touch him again?

He would be lying to himself if he said he hadn't felt a strange tension between them in the last few weeks. Chalking it up to stress or their demanding workloads, he had tried to force any other possibilities to the back of his mind. There wasn't much time to consider the implications of romance, but her gentle touch had started him wondering again. Wondering if he was crazy, or simply misunderstanding her actions somehow. When he returned back home, he told himself, he would sit and take a closer look at all the signs – think through every tiny detail and plan how to fit her more closely into his life realistically. If he wanted his own wishes to come true about spending more time with her, he would have to rearrange his duties with the Order and stop taking so many risks. Maybe he could convince Colonel Melnik to consider recruiting her?

Then, as he had been questioning himself, he felt an interruption in his aura, the tingling sense that something was nearby. But it wasn't anything dangerous, and it wasn't the familiar haunting dark atmosphere that filled the tunnels.

Three inches, two inches, one. She had come down onto both knees and steeled herself, having to straighten her back up tall in order to reach his level. Breathing as shallowly as she possibly could while still getting enough oxygen to function, she leaned in. There was the deep and familiar smell of his perspiration, but it was absolutely the opposite of repulsive, it was enticing. How she longed to just wrap herself up in his scent and lay in it forever, wrap her arms around and hold onto him.

A flash of fire rushed through her and sparked her muscles to finish the action because her mind had seized up on that final thought. Her soft lips met his cheek, and it gently pricked her with its short stubble, hooking into her like a million thorns, like the Velcro on the tabs of the body armor he always wore, and she remained there, wanting to be stuck forever.

The moment she made contact ignited another hot electric spark that shot down his body like a bullet and left him unable to move. She had turned out to be very daring today, and he had arrived to Novokuznetskaya unprepared for this kind of interaction. He thought he would have had more time to process the possibilities of their relationship before deciding that he was just crazy and giving up on the idea entirely, but fate had decided otherwise. What was just a childish fantasy in the back of his mind had now come full circle before he had gotten the chance to completely deconstruct the notion as he did with every other situation that crossed his path. Though he had witnessed some telling signals with increasing frequency over the past few months, he hadn't considered how it might escalate, or why he was allowing it to. Perhaps this one area was his weakness, and he couldn't plan tactically or strategically for her advances, he had simply allowed her to walk straight in and surround him, but he also found that there was not an ounce of regret. In fact, he had completely detached from interfering with the progression of their partnership from the very beginning, and let it take its own course, growing like a wildflower in the soil of providence. He could not forget that Aleks was her own separate and amazing human being, with her own thoughts, and dreams, and hopes, and fears, and that was what drew his attention to her in the first place. From their very first conversation, their relationship had steadily spread out its roots and grown as its own entity – progressing from mutual intrigue, to reverent respect, to admiration, to affection, and now to passion. His only fear had been in disappointing her somehow, in finding out that he had misread her intentions, or in allowing his emotions to cloud his judgment in other areas which could compromise her safety. Having come down the path this far, now there was no turning back, and her decisive action demanded a response, he couldn't simply brush her away or pretend it hadn't happened. With open arms he welcomed this new reality right into his soul without any further question, even though it had seemed so fantastically impossible before. Once the warmth of her kiss spread, the roots of the organism burrowed into him and begged for sustenance, he was able to move with certainty again.

He turned his head ever so slowly, so as not to shake her away, gently gripping her shoulders so she would know that he wasn't going to let her go. Leaning in until their noses touched, he caressed hers with his own, gauging her reaction to his response and waiting for her unspoken permission as the blindfold prohibited him from looking into her beautiful eyes. She moved stiffly, breathing so shallowly that he could barely feel the air against his skin, perhaps she was just as astonished by the force of nature that was sweeping them quickly along the river of destiny. He raised one hand to trace her delicate jaw line with his fingertips, reassuring her with his nearly imperceptible touch that he would be gentle and patient. He didn't even anticipate how tender he could be with another human being and was surprising himself with his actions, as if some outside entity was controlling him like a puppet because he would never have guessed that he was capable.

At his touch, she tilted her head up, officiating the sacred invitation to her lips, and he accepted it, feeling a wash of energy envelop him and course through from the top down and back up again. Their lips met in a close embrace which both had been looking forward to for a long time and that neither wanted to break. The only disturbance was of one of her hands reaching up to remove the blindfold and then settling around his neck, anchoring him there for what could be a blissful eternity. He broke away from her momentarily only to dive back in with renewed fervor, more forcefully meeting her mouth with parted lips, moving against her as if desperately trying to speak but not having any words. And she was speaking back to him, not simply yielding and accepting, but participating in this dance in perfect rhythm with him.

When he could finally convince himself to pull away for breath, she opened up her cloudy sky colored eyes and looked up at him with fresh perspective. He too, was seeing her in a new light, clear and bright and no longer crowded with the dark wispy haze of uncertainty. This force that surrounded them and the roots of the wildflower were all that existed now, and even if he could go back in time, not a single thing left on the scarred Earth could force him to.

"I thought so." She said breathlessly, that same satisfied smile spreading across her pink lips.

"Thought what?" He replied quietly, continuing to stroke her delicate face with one hand, his other arm still not releasing her and hanging around her shoulder.

"That you felt the same way as I do." She said, glancing down for a second but then looking back up for his response.

"I almost didn't know it myself." He said, knitting up a brow as if he were still unconvinced that this was reality and didn't want it to fade away before his eyes.

"What do you mean?" She mirrored his expression, shifting herself directly in front of him and leaning one arm on his legs.

"I didn't think it could be real. It's not what I first intended back when… at Kitai-Gorod." He let his arm slip from her shoulder and took up her hand in his lap.

"Oh I know," she relaxed her face and eased into his touch, "But I guess now we've come to the station of fate after all."

He couldn't reply at that moment and was just losing himself in her sparkling silver blue eyes.

"Are you afraid? Of me? Of destiny?" She reached up her free hand and traced from his temple to his squared jaw.

"Not anymore." He couldn't contain a smile, leaning down and kissing her once again.