He loves being married to her.

He loves it.

But there are times he worries he is too old, too stubborn, too resistant to new things.

The last thing he wants is to make her regret marrying him.

He is trying, slowly, to change. But at the Abbey, he is the Butler, and it is difficult to unbend himself from his stiff exterior. When Mrs. Patmore finds herself connected to a scandal, it is his default position to worry about the reputation of the family he has served for so long.

The cook and her assistant set off. His wife, supportive as ever of their friend, wishes them luck. What comes out of his mouth is impulsive.

"Good luck to us all, in the vain hope that we'll avoid scandalous gossip."

She shakes her head, moving toward the doorway.

"You're such an old curmudgeon!" She sounds exasperated.

"Don't say you're going off me." He says it lightly, but his expression betrays a sliver of his anxiety. Perhaps this will be the straw that breaks the camel's back. First with the cooking debacle, now with this nonsense. She's probably wondering why she agreed to marry me, old booby that I am.

She turns around, keys jingling together at her hip. "No," she says. Something in the way the word curves off of her tongue makes his heart flip. There is a hint of a smile on her face, but more of it in her eyes.

He reminds himself to breathe. The affection she conveys simply by looking at him still astounds him. She steps closer.

"Because you're my curmudgeon, and that makes all the difference."

Standing on her toes, she grips his left arm and kisses him on the cheek. The touch of her lips on his skin reassures him in a way nothing else can. She trails her hand down his arm.

Happy, he raises his eyebrows at her as she smiles back.

The Butler is disappearing inside the man. For most of his life it was the other way around. He is a man who loves his wife, and cherishes her love for him. She has freed him. Freed him from a solitary life. He is free as he has never been before. Free to receive her kiss. Free to unburden himself. Free to love her the way she deserves.

The fact that she kisses him in the kitchen, where anyone can see them, does not bother him at all.

The only thing that does is that he did not kiss her properly.

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She adores being his wife.

She adores it.

Even when he frustrates her with his outdated remarks, his clinging to the past.

It is who he is, she reflects. She's known that for a long time. And she accepts him the way he is.

The Housekeeper is mostly gone now, replaced by a woman. Oh, she still does her job well. But he has freed her. She is free to laugh out loud. Free to let her guard down. Free to love him in the way she has wanted to love him for many years.

The frisson of heat that licks down her back when his eyes flicker to her lips nearly makes her come undone. She almost kisses him on the lips, just for that. At the last moment, she remembers they are not alone downstairs, and she leaves a lingering gift on his cheek instead. She hopes it will be sufficient until later.

It is.

Barely.

The sun is still setting in the west when he stops within sight of their front door. The kiss he gives her then makes her cheeks glow like the burnt-colored sky. She returns it, loving the feel of his arms around her, holding her close.

They half-walk, half-stumble their way into the cottage. She laughs, biting her lip, thinking of how they are dashing away like two young things forty years younger, and of the day he sang of how she stole his heart away.

She knows she will struggle in the morning to find all of her hairpins.

And he will have to ask where, exactly, his collar went.

But none of that matters when they are alone in the bedroom. In their bed.

Their movements in symmetry.

He is always careful with her, ever the gentleman, never pushing her beyond what is comfortable. His touch drives her to behave in ways that embarrass her later. But he assures her that he does not think less of her, no matter what she does or - more often - what she says, in the throes of passion. If anything, he seems rather proud of the fact that he elicits such reactions from her. His wide smirk drives her to playfully slap his arm, which only makes him laugh.

She loves hearing him laugh.

'Go off him'? How could he even think such a thing? She knew when he said it, that he meant it. Underneath the even tone, she heard the voice of the man who asked her on a Christmas Eve night what they were celebrating.

She knows how his reserve hides a gentle heart.

It is impossible to resist her curmudgeon when he looks at her with such open adoration. His fingers caress her face, her unbound hair. She reaches out to touch the soft hair on his chest. Her left hand only rests over his heart for a moment, before he lifts it to his lips and brushes his lips across her knuckles.

He rubs his thumb across her ring, and they smile at each other.

They belong to each other. And that makes all the difference.