Disclaimer: Everything related to SMK belongs to Warner Brothers and Shoot the Moon Enterprises, Ltd.

Author's Note: This is a departure for me in that it's the first time that I've written Amanda and Lee as a (proper) couple. Set in season 4 (ayiana2, don't say I never do anything for you...), post-Mission of Gold.

Bound

By Laurie

In the elevator she slipped the wedding band onto her finger. She had already reached the point of missing it when she wasn't wearing it. Strange, when her chances to wear it were so few. During the day when she thought of Lee, or even when she didn't think of him, her hand would move to the thin chain around her neck, the one that kept the ring with her at all times but away from all eyes. The cool metal settled into place, taking in the warmth from her skin.

Her progress upward seemed achingly slow; it would have been faster if she'd taken the stairs; she would have run up them. It had been too long since she had been there, since she had been able to be alone with her husband somewhere that wasn't the Agency. Her husband - the word still made her giddy. It was the first time since they had returned from California. The first time Amanda had been able to escape, finally, her mother's beady-eyed concern. When the elevator car halted, she was through the doors as soon as the opening was wide enough to allow her through.

Amanda slid her key into the lock, let herself in and took some pride in the fact that she had achieved it noiselessly. She crossed the living room, still trying to get used to the idea of calling this place theirs and not just his.

'Lee?'

'I'm in here.'

She followed his voice to the bedroom; it was filled with the steam swirling out of the bathroom through the open door and her husband's head emerged from the blue sweater he had just pulled on. The colour suited him, it reflected the deeper shades in his eyes. Lee smiled at her, pushing still-damp hair back from his forehead.

'You're early.'

'I could always come back later.'

He padded across to her, that unhurried stride that always made her think of a panther. Beautiful predator, he caught her, his prey, his arms around her waist. 'Just you try.' He kissed her. 'I was going to cook you dinner.'

She tilted her head, amused. 'You really like cooking, don't you?'

'For you I do, I didn't always bother that much before. You know how it is cooking for one.'

'I don't think I ever have,' she mused. 'Even at college there were always about four of us at least.'

'You didn't miss much.' He paused. 'Nothing's ready, by the way-'

'So I see,' she remarked, her mouth twitching. Lee's housekeeping skills had improved with time but time had evidently been against him tonight. The room wasn't a wreck but it was in more disarray than it had been for months - at least, more than she had seen it for months.

He scowled at her, playing the game. 'I meant dinner. At the moment it's still cold and raw - so I hope you're not hungry.'

She slide her hands up, across his chest and the soft wool, linked her fingers together behind his neck. 'There's no hurry - we've got all night.'

Lee's sigh was exaggerated but still heartfelt. 'Oh, Mrs Stetson, say that again.'

'We have all night,' she repeated slowly, playing with the words.

His hands ran along the lines of her back. 'I love you.'

'Say that again.'

He repeated the words as they stood there, murmured them into her ear; they stood for a long time, wrapped in one another, then they kissed tenderly, intimately, and his words were lost in her mouth. Things that had once been so difficult to say were now so easy, natural.

He told her as they stood there, told her again when she lay across the bed holding his weight against her. Amanda lost herself in sensation: in his voice, in the feel of him, in the lamplight picking out the gold in his hair and the sheen across his skin. He still always would leave the lamp on. Lamplight. He would see-

She stiffened suddenly, withdrawing from him.

'Amanda? What? What's wrong?' Confusion and concern and he was as tensed as she was.

'It's- You haven't-'

Lee ran through in his mind desperately all the things that he should have done but hadn't, and to him they were legion, but could not think of the one that mattered here, now.

'This is the first time we've... Since before.'

'I know.' He didn't take it as an opening, didn't make a corny joke to tease her out of this sudden blackness. He waited.

Amanda moistened her lips. 'I'm not saying that I was perfect before, heaven knows I wasn't, you can't be after you've had two kids, but I tried and I was more or less intact-' She stopped herself, the warm weight of his hand on her hip steadied her; she made herself meet his eyes and felt stupid and shallow and vain before she even said it. 'It's not the same; I'm not the same. I have scars.'

'So do I, you've seen them; if you're repulsed by them you've done a good job of hiding it.'

'Of course I'm not,' she said quickly. Lee had spoken gently; the huskiness in his voice always bit harder when he was gentle. 'But it's different for a man.'

'Is it?'

She shrugged awkwardly. 'I guess. I think. On a man it's ... manly. Women aren't supposed to be.'

'Manly?'

She glared at him. 'You know what I mean. They're ugly; that's not what you're used to.'

His hand moved from her hip to her face, his fingers dancing lightly across her cheek. 'When you were hurt I thought I'd lost you; you were brave, you fought so hard, you came back to me. Do you really think I give a damn about anything else?'

Sometimes, she thought, sometimes it had been easier back when he had been cold, harsh, when he had pretended not to care. His hand moved again, found the fastenings of her blouse and unbuttoned her, exposed her an inch at a time and she shivered involuntarily against the air on her skin. He peeled back the safety of the barricade and looked at her.

Amanda looked away, not wanting to see the expression on his face. There already been too many others wearing looks she had not wished to see. The clinical detachment of the doctors and technicians; her mother's anguish when, still stiff and wracked and barely able to move, Amanda had required help to bathe and Dotty had wept openly at the sight of her daughter's marred body.

She could not bear it from Lee. She couldn't take the professional, shuttered look that he always got when his feelings started to get too much; she couldn't stand the thought of his pity. He had been silent. Amanda bit down on her lip, turned her head back. And Lee seemed ... thoughtful. Absorbed. His gaze moved over her slowly, taking her in. He looked as though he were looking at a piece of art, as though he were seeing her for the first time with the same wonder, hunger.

His fingers touched one of the dark lines across her skin and she sucked in a breath.

'Does it hurt?'

She shook her head.

His mouth followed the scars, his tongue darting against her skin. Her nails pressed into the flesh at the back of his neck. He lifted his head, moved over her, looked down at her.

'God, I've missed you.'

She put her arms around him, one hand sliding across the taut skin at the base of his spine, feeling the play of muscle. 'I've missed you too.'

He made love to every part of her, reclaiming her, possessing her body and giving it back to her; she took his gift, took him, eagerly.

Afterwards, when she lay in his arms with her face turned into the curve of his shoulder and his breath warm against her neck, she wondered that if someone were to see their souls, able to examine them, would they see the marks where his soul had been bound to hers. Her hand moved idly, finding the places where his smooth skin gave way to something rougher, her fingers tracing the ragged lines of stitching and damaged tissue. A bullet-wound, and another, then something that could have been made by a knife. The past was inscribed on his body, just as it now was on hers. And it didn't matter, he had been right there.

It was strange, she thought, that reversal - or maybe not so strange, that was how things were supposed to work. She had grown used to being the one teaching him about the things that mattered, showing him what was important. When she told him that he laughed slightly and placed his hand over hers.

'I always knew what was important - why do you think I tried to avoid it for so long? It took you coming along to make me want it.'

'Do you still want it?' She laced her fingers through his.

'Yes. I want all of it and more. I want you and our family and everything that goes with it.'

She sighed. 'But for now...'

He smiled - still that same hunger. 'For now there's this, and this is everything.'

Fin