A/N: Sorry it's been a long time since I've posted again. I had a long, busy weekend/week. But, I hope you guys like this new chapter. Let me know in the comments. :)

April 1916

Sounds of laughter filled the Coulter home once the front door opened and closed as Lee, Rosemary, and Elizabeth returned from next door. Their laughter turned quiet as they saw Abigail sitting at the dinner table alone.

"Abigail?" Elizabeth said as Lee closed the door behind them and they all moved to stand around the table.

"Where did Henry go?" Lee asked, looking around.

"He went home." Abigail stated flatly.

"How long ago did he leave?" Rosemary wondered.

"I don't know. Maybe twenty minutes." The mayor just looked down at the table in front of her.

"Was there an emergency?" Elizabeth wondered as she sat down beside Abigail.

"No. I just think he was a bit overwhelmed by all of this." She finally looked up at her friends and forced out a smile though her eyes were a bit teary and sad.

"All of what?" Elizabeth asked, already recognizing the sadness in her friend's eyes and she placed a hand on the back of Abigail's chair, ready to rub her back for comfort if she needed it.

"The idea of him and I."

"Oh, that is ridiculous!" Rosemary said.

"Sweetheart." Lee tried to calm her down.

"What?! That man is more stubborn than I thought." His wife exclaimed. "We put together such a nice little, romantic dinner with some candles and even gave them some time alone together and he still manages to be, all,...Henry Gowen about it!" Rosemary frowned.

"You do have to admit that we kind of ambushed him." Lee told her.

"This was no ambush! If it were an ambush, we would have made signs and chanted 'tell her how you feel!'" His wife disagreed.

"He made it very clear that he wants nothing to do with me." Abigail jumped in again. "Unless it is just him and I….he will not show any semblance of liking toward me."

"Is that what he said?" Rosemary asked as if she didn't believe that for a minute.

"I asked him to stay if he felt anything for me and he left. What does that tell you?"

"That he's scared." The actress said with sympathy toward Henry again. "What were his exact words?"

"Well…first of all, he accused ME of putting you three up to this tonight…AND the Mistletoe at Christmas. And then he said that none of you would ever want us together because I am the town's hero and he is the villain…..And then he left."

"Mhm. See. That's it." Rosemary smiled to herself as she made a realization.

"What's it?" Elizabeth asked her.

"Abigail? Do you have any interest in being with Henry?" Rosemary asked the older woman.

"Well, I-..."

"Because if you do…then you are going to have to make the first move."

"Rosie, what on earth are you talking about?" Her husband asked.

"Don't you see?" Rosemary looked at all three of them. "He doesn't think you would want to be with him because of your history. And I am sure he is afraid that you won't want to be seen with him in town because people would disapprove."

"That is ridiculous." Abigail told her.

"The only way to reassure him is to make the first move and especially…in public. Once he sees that you are not afraid to be with him in front of the people of Hope Valley…then he will come to his senses and stop being so afraid." Rosie smiled and let out a sigh. "I'm brilliant!"

"Are you now?" Elizabeth asked in a sarcastic tone before she and Abigail made eye contact and chuckled a bit.

"I don't know, Rosemary. Perhaps I should just respect his wishes and give up trying." The cafe owner said.

"Oh, no! You never give up on a chance to be in love!" The younger blonde protested.

"I'm not getting any younger, Rosemary. And it's not like I have much time for chasing with my busy schedule. If he doesn't want to try then I will leave it be." She stood up from her chair. "I don't think my heart can take dealing with a man again anyways." She chuckled but her eyes teared up again. "Shall we have some apple pie?"

"I would LOVE some." Lee said, holding his stomach as he wished for a change in the subject.

"Lee!" Rosemary said, looking at him with frustration.

"What? It smells delicious." Her husband sat down in his seat again. "Thank you, Abigail."

"Yes, it does smell very good." Elizabeth admitted, wanting a piece as well.

"Perfect." Abigail nodded. "May I ask where you keep your pie spatula?"

"In the top drawer on the-" Lee began to answer her as Rosemary gently smacked his shoulder. "-left. Ow!" He rubbed his shoulder.

"Lee!" His wife exclaimed his name again before throwing her hands up in the air and she sat down too. "Oh, fine. Eat your pie. Change the subject. But I WILL get down to the bottom of this."

About an hour or so later, Abigail made her way home with the rest of the pie. She couldn't help but think about Henry the whole time they ate it, knowing that he and his sweet tooth would have loved it. The subject of Henry only came up once more at the Coulters' that night and she finally told them that she had been feeling confused about him lately. She said that she would have enjoyed the ATTEMPT at courting him, but wasn't so sure herself if it were a good idea. What Rosemary had said actually made sense. No one in town would approve of them and perhaps that was what held Abigail back as well. SHE wasn't sure if she approved of herself being with him either.

The music and laughter coming from the saloon grew louder the closer she was toward the center of town and she couldn't help but look up at the balcony floor where Henry's room was. She didn't expect to see him step out onto the balcony right at that very moment. She watched him look up at the sky, resting both of his hands on the railing in front of him. With a big sigh, Henry laid his head down and Abigail could tell by his body language that he was upset.

She kept walking until she was directly under the Queen of Hearts sign and Henry's eyes opened to see her there. She attempted to gently smile up at him but he turned around and went back inside his room, closing the balcony door so she wouldn't even be able to yell up to him. At least not over the saloon music.

With a small sigh and even a roll of the eyes, Abigail kept walking toward the cafe with her pie, entering through the back door. She set the pie on the counter and removed her light jacket, hanging it up on the hook beside the door. Looking around at the small mess she had made whilst she was baking the pie earlier, she debated cleaning it up or not. Her brain was too exhausted. Her body was too exhausted. She looked at the wooden spoon on the counter before knocking it onto the floor. "Oops." She said aloud to herself before smiling a bit and she knocked the whisk off the counter as well. She chuckled a bit before heading for the staircase, deciding that, for once, she was going to leave the mess as it was.

Just as she lifted her skirt to prevent herself from tripping, and took two or three steps up onto the stairs, she heard a faint knock on the cafe's back door before it opened. She looked over right shoulder at the man walking through the door. He closed it behind him and they just stared at each other. Their eyes communicating when their mouths did not need to. Henry's eyes looked at her apologetically. Abigail's eyes told him that she was both hurt and furious with him for leaving.

Once Henry understood what her eyes told him, he carefully stepped over to the bottom of the staircase to stand just below her as he gently spoke. "It was wrong of me to leave the way I did." He told her. "I do not expect you or the others to forgive me….but least of all, you. It was not my intention to hurt you tonight, Abigail. And I'm sorry."

His words brought tears to her eyes, especially when the sound in his voice told her how sincere he was. Every emotion he ever made her feel, the good, the bad, in the past, in the present, never ceased to be so intense that she felt like her body would explode with all of them. She once understood that to just be hatred for him after the horrible things he had done. But even now…the good emotions he made her feel made her want to explode as well. And she knew that she didn't hate him. But she couldn't make that feeling go away.

It took over her and she had no time to stop her right hand from reaching up and slapping him in the face for making her feel that way, her tears falling down her cheeks as she did. She instantly realized what she had done and rested her hand over his cheek before leaning down to kiss him passionately. She felt like exploding again as she used her kiss to apologize to him. He used the kiss in the same way, apologizing for everything bad he had ever done and for leaving tonight.

Once they broke the kiss, Abigail looked into his eyes, tears still falling down her face, and she took both of his hands, pulling him up the stairs and toward her bedroom.

Standing at the foot of her bed, they looked into each other's eyes before Abigail took Henry's hand and guided it to her chest, allowing him to feel the pounding in her heart. He soon took hers and did the same. The woman closed her eyes, focusing on the matching rhythms.

When her eyes opened, she saw him reach up to carefully remove the clip from her hair, allowing the rest of her curls to fall. "This was very pretty tonight." Henry told her about her hairstyle. "But it is beautiful like this." He set her clip down on her dresser before moving her hair aside and leaning over to kiss her neck.

Abigail tilted her head for him, softly humming as she closed her eyes and began to unbutton her blouse, removing it followed by her lavender skirt. She soon took hold of Henry's head and made him lift it so she could kiss him on the lips again. Once he was distracted by their battling tongues, Abigail let go of his face and began to untie her corset in the back. She hummed once it was undone and broke the kiss to turn around so her back was to the man, showing him that the corset was undone and that he could remove it.

His eyes looked her up and down from behind before he gently took hold of the corset, which was only staying on by the will of Abigail's hand holding the front of it to her chest. "Abigail, are you sure?"

She let out a breath at the way he said her name, knowing for sure that she WAS his any time he spoke like that. "Yes." She told him. "I need to feel your hands on me." She practically whispered, biting her bottom lip at the thought of his big, warm hands all over her bare skin.

He gently kissed the back of her shoulder before pushing the woman's corset off of her with ease and she moved her hand to let it fall. It wasn't long before she felt his fingers sliding passed her ribs to wrap around her from behind, his hands moving up to rest just under her breasts and he kissed her neck again, this time from behind. Abigail felt a tingling between her legs, every touch from him sending chills up and down her spine and she softly moaned his name.

"I want to see you." He gently spoke into her ear and she wanted to explode again, but instead, she turned to face him. Her heart pounded even harder as her nerves caused her to shiver. Henry's eyes stayed on hers for a moment, as if waiting for her to change her mind and when she didn't, he let his eyes fall to her bare breasts. Without a word, he pushed her under-skirt off of her and down to the floor to see her entirely. She was beautiful. As he had suspected. But more beautiful than he had dreamt of. "You are like an angel." He hadn't meant to say out loud.

"Nonsense." She argued.

"I mean it, Abigail." Was all he had to say and she believed him.

They kissed once more and removed his clothes before Abigail laid down on her bed and beckoned him to do the same. Once he hovered over her, Abigail hiked a leg up to Henry's side and gently slid it back and forth for comfort. She looked into his eyes, reading them as if he had asked her 'why now?'

Before the man could even think to ask the question out loud, Abigail gently smiled up at him and whispered. "I am yours." Her fingers found their way up into his hair as she massaged it, his soft smile melting her on the inside. "Why can't we be like this out there?" She asked him. "In front of everyone else?" She kept massaging his hair. "I don't care what they think."

His smile faded and he sighed. "Can we not talk about this?" He asked her. "Not now."

"Okay, but only if you promise me that we WILL talk about it later." She negotiated well, even in moments like this. "Hm?"

He sighed again, her eyes sparkling up at him making HIM melt inside. "Yes, alright." He told her.

She smiled and leaned up to kiss him as her free hand slid down his chest and abs before gently wrapping around his member. She massaged him and his hair at the same time, soon causing him to grow for her and she hiked her other leg up to his hip as well. She positioned him at her entrance and he broke the kiss to look into her eyes as he slowly moved inside her.