"Oh, but you have," he answers, breathless. And she knows it, too, the minx - she's smiling much too brightly not to be in on the joke here. "You just haven't done enough."

They're both in on it; he's smiling down at her, pink-cheeked and utterly indulgent as he touches the ridge of one of her ears, drawing his fingers along the fine line of it. Slow and steady, it turns out, has its own appeal. They might not be able to recreate the wild frenzy of their first encounters, at the moment, but right now, he doesn't want to. Not when the alternative feels like this.