Betty Jo set her brush down and shook her hair out.  After the day she'd had she couldn't believe she was contemplating what she was contemplating but she didn't think she could handle being away from him for days, weeks, however long knowing the conversation was coming.  One of these days, she promised herself, he was going to pay for how hard she worked on this relationship.  Then she grinned.  He paid, every day, every time he smiled at her, said her name in that way he had, touched her, let his eyes linger on her when he thought she didn't see -- he paid alright and in a coin that made her go weak in the knees. 

She smoothed her hair one more time and left the bathroom, closing the door quietly behind her.  He was standing with his back to her, looking out over the Refuge as it lay still and serene, everything hushed for the night.  She put her arms around him from behind and rested her cheek on his back. 

"Hullo. I was enjoying the countryside. We should spend more time out of London."

"You think?  I always see you as a big city type.  I'd like it though."

"Do you like the country house enough to spend more time there? I could have it updated. Since I spent so little time there myself for so long, I just didn't have the interest to do it."

"Yes I do."  She smiled.  "I can see Edwards organizing a renovation to make sure it was absolutely right for an earl."

"He'd leave you no peace," he warned. "He'd be chasing after you clutching swatches for wallpaper, draperies and sofas. Paint chips for the rest of it, questions regarding Italian or Moroccan marble."

"We'd come to an understanding in a hurry, trust me.  We actually already have for the most part."

He turned in her arms to smile down at her. "Have you indeed. I've noticed my sock drawer has been straightened."

"He's happy with the little things, you know," she said.

He sighed and frowned. "Conspiring with my valet. What will the gossip columns say."

"Do I care?  Besides if it makes you nervous conspire with my maid."

"Not my type," he replied. "I will ask her, whilst you're gone, if she would stay with you if we do spend more time in the country. Are you happy with her?  You don't have to have a maid if you'd rather not. Tell Edwards he can live with the shame."

She grinned.  "I'll think about it while I'm gone, managing without her.  But who knows, she may quit because I can get along so easily without her."  She stretched up and kissed him.  "You however are a different matter."

"I don't think you need have any fear that I will quit because you can get along without me.  I might do a good deal of whinging about sleeping alone, however."

Her lips quivered.  "Console yourself with the reflection that I will be suffering too in my own lonely, and strange, bed.  But that wasn't what I meant, as you very well know.  Which is what I want to to talk with you about."

"Talk away," he said, touching a curl of hair that rested on her shoulder.

"It's sort of a speech to start with and a confession about how I maybe shot myself in the foot, if you can stand that and not interrupting no matter how stupid I get."

"Ah. One of those. Can we perhaps lay on the bed?  Or is that too distracting?"

"No, it's not," she said.  I think I'd like it better actually."

A few minutes later, they were tucked up under the covers, his arm around her but laying on their sides so they could regard each other. "I'm listening. I pledge not to interrupt no matter how badly I might want to, until you give me leave to respond."

She grinned.  "You really are a very nice man."  She hesitated for minute and then went on.  "I don't know you might feel about the idea of being pursued, but I should probably start by confessing that I decided I wanted you long before I asked you out.  And after we went out the first few times I decided based on what I was deducing about you that the hardest thing I was going to have to do was not scare you off." 

She stopped for a minute and studied his face.  "I'm starting to think that maybe that's where I made my mistake because I concluded the only way to not scare you was to make absolutely no demands, to not expect a thing and just wait for you to...well whatever.  And if I was going to do that, then to keep it honest I was going to have to make sure that whatever I said was exactly what I meant --  no cant, no games, no fudging.  That, of course, meant being careful about every word I said."

She bit her lip and looked past him for a moment.  "I didn't realize that that sort of effort would have quite the opposite effect of what I intended.  And the only way I know to fix it is to explain it.  Plus I needed to explain it now because I also seem to have convinced you somehow that the ramifications of the fact that you're, as you describe it, 'old fashioned' are a problem for me, or that they will be if you don't make sure you stifle that whole part yourself.

"The reality is I like that part of you, just like I like and am attracted to...get turned on by...alpha kinds of men.  I don't have a problem with it because I grew up with it and I know how to deal with it.  I learned the basics watching mama keep daddy in line and then I went to work in a world filled with alpha males."  She stopped and met his eyes.  "End confessional speech.  Should I make an act of contrition?"

"Indeed you should. You should make mad passionate love with me."

Her eyes flew open wide.  "Anytime you want."

"Now," he said and kissed her silent and didn't let her think one thought for the next hour or so. Only afterwards, when they lay in each other's arms, and she was biting her lip, and he noticed it, did he respond.

"Betty Jo," he said, getting her attention. "Thank you for explaining to me. I'm a fairly simple fellow. I like to know what someone is thinking. Especially you. All I ask is that you be yourself, with no .. filters based on what you think I want, or believe or whatever. It's the only way I can really be. Otherwise I feel confused and inept."  He paused and drew a hand along the side of her face. "Can we agree to be that way with one another from here on out? I won't censor myself, and you won't either?"

She nodded, her eyes suddenly bright with tears.  "I promise.  I've been so afraid...and then this and being pregnant and...I really am an idiot, aren't I?"

"In the spirit of our oh so recent agreement let me say that I desperately want to spank you. No, you are not an idiot. I couldn't love an idiot, because I'm far too proud to do so."

She made a hiccuping sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob and buried her face in his neck, holding him tight.

He stroked her back and held her. "You'd best be careful whilst in Las Vegas. Otherwise, I won't be responsible for the consequences."

She sniffed and emerged from his neck.  "I will be, I promise.  Even more so because I've you to come home to."