She tries not to fidget with the hem of her summery dress as she looks down at the floor, thinking, remembering. She certainly knows how she feels about him.

She trusts him. That infectious, cheeky, mischievous, impish smirk of his makes it hard not to. She's fallen asleep with him ever night since moving to New York. She wouldn't have been able to if she didn't trust him. She feels safe with him. Not because he'll protect her, She would hope he knows better than that, but because she's not afraid of him.

Of course, he's been able to do the same. There have been quite a few nights when she had just watched him sleep, well aware that she could kill him and walk away. It's a good thing she's not that heartless. And he trusts her.

That's what makes what they had (no, have) so important to her. She's not willing to give up the fight just because of one skirmish.

She walks over to him and takes his hands in hers. She runs her thumbs over the backs of his knuckles and looks up at him.

"You trust me," she says simply. "If you didn't, you wouldn't have fallen asleep with me. And you love me. Otherwise you never would've suggested building a house together.

"Nowadays, that doesn't mean much when folk can pack up and move three thousand miles without too much trouble," she adds. "But we're old enough to remember a time when a house wasn't just four walls and a roof. It was a home, a sanctuary, and the fact you want something so permanent with me means a lot. I'm just a bloody eejit for questioning that."

She swallows hard, not realising it would be so difficult to ask this, but she does anyway. "Forgive me?"