She touched his eyelids with her fingertip. Then his nose and his lips, as if discovering his beautiful face, even while their bodies were joined so intimately, and she was filled with warmth and an unbearable longing.

"It’s yes," she choked. "You know it’s yes!"

For how could it ever be anything else?

—------------

A sound awoke Vivian as the quiet light of dawn was drifting in through the window. She continued to lie there for a few seconds, grappling to make sense of her unfamiliar surroundings, then she remembered and her heart gave a thump.

Twisting her head on the pillow she saw that the place beside her in...