AN: feeling a bit lonely, figured I would channel that towards my favorite pairing.

Misao could tell that something wasn't right. It wasn't anything he was doing, because, really, the man was anything but unpredictable in his patterns. He lived his life regimented, by routine. And so seeing one Mibu Ookami sitting on the porch smoking his cigarette at this time was typical, usual even for his petite wife to see. How she had ever married him was anyone's guess and infact their coupling was the current talk of the town. After all Saitou was not exactly the most sociable and polite officers in Kyoto. And Misao was a beloved icon of their bolstering city, a part of the old and new.

Misao sighed, blowing the bangs out of her face with a sigh of frustration. Saitou Hajime was a cold and calloused man to those who did not know him and he liked to keep it that way, the baka. It made his job often times easier for him. He was the kind of man that tried to keep everyone at arms length, to distance himself from his job, his emotions and feelings. He didn't want to hinder anyone to burden anyone with his feelings, but Hajime would never admit this. He was used to being so strong all the time. But even he couldn't avoid the regret he felt on this holiday. He couldn't overlook his own feelings. It was the day of the Shinsengumi's downfall. Misao knew, remembered the things he'd told her though getting him to talk of such things was like pulling teeth, but the fact that he;d told her, had trusted her with something so sacred to him made her heart soar.

Misao would never forget when he told her, would never forget something so important to the man who held her heart, whom she had married in spite of the problems and the grouchiness. And though he sat on the porch, smoking a cigarette as he watched the birds chirp, and eat at their bird feeder, he couldn't fool her. She knew something was wrong and she wasn't about to let him get a way with being unsociable and reclusive. Not from her, anyways.

Misao walked up long braid snaking behind her, bounding after her as she stopped in front of him. She wore the Oniwabanshuu gi she always had. Ocean green eyes took in dull amber. It was his eyes that gave him away.

"Any particular reason you're blocking my view, Itachi girl?" Saitou asked, smoke floating as he pulled his cigarette from his lips, exhaling the smoke.

Misao didn't answer. She took his cigarette from his gloved hand and ground it beneath her heel.

"I wasn't finished with that" Saitou glared. It was a known fact that his wife did not approve of him smoking his cigarettes. She would never admit that she liked the taste of them on his lips and that she missed the smell when it wasn't on him because he didn't smell like himself then. Misao still didn't respond and that irritated him

"If you're going to be annoying and not even bother to say why-" He started.

Before Saitou knew it, she was curling herself in his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck.

Saitou tensed, the feeling of her pressing herself against him so openly still unfamiliar, cumbersome. The girl was a handful really and he never quite knew what she was up to. He wasn't used to someone so open to their feelings being around him all the time. She changed him and that in and of itself was a nuisance. He liked who he was. He wasn't a man used to being touched and felt. Itachi was a cuddler and it was awkward still, though one of the things that had attracted him to his petite wife in the first place. He had married her for pete's sake so there had to be some admirable qualities in his relationship.

"Itachi-"He started to complain, even as his arms were wrapping around her to keep the girl from falling off his lap, in one of her typical bouts of clumsiness. Really he was forced to dote on her nearly every waking moment. How the girl had taken care of herself for so long as she traversed Japan he would never know. It was a good thing she had run into him when she had during their Kyoto adventures with Shishio.

"It's okay to be sad. To feel sad, Hajime." She retorted, burying her head in his shoulder as she cuddled closer, refusing to be pushed away or aside.

Saitou's eyes widened and then returned. "Misao.."

He felt her lips on his neck and suddenly his thoughts took on a new derailed train of thought as he sucked in a sharp breathe. Itachi's tongue kissed a trail up his neck, and she placed delicate kisses along the side of his jaw. Saitou closed his eyes, reveling in the feeling his mind completely distracted. She always distracted him. How had he ever thought that was a good quality, a desireable quality in a woman. She was keeping him from his thoughts, his work. Why had he married her again? Ah yes, he thought as she nibbled, there was that

The sheer desire that coursed through him every time she used those lips, those hands to touch him, taste him...The protectiveness that came, arose whenever she was in danger, the need to have her light her laughter around him to keep him from sinking in the ghosts from his past.

Misao's lips kissed the corner of his own, trailing and teasing. Saitou had had about enough, fingers digging circles into her hips. He grabbed her with a growl, bringing her up to him and kissing her, as he readjusted the girl more comfortably on his lap.

She grinned into his kiss like a pleased cat, apparently having found the reaction she was looking for and he found himself annoyed with her for being so smug. The waves had turned it seemed. And he wasn't the only one picking up habits of his beloved, albeit impertinent spouse.

"Minx" He told her with a glare, looking upon his thoroughly kissed subject at hand.

Misao grinned, lips kiss swollen, cheeks a becoming shade of pink. "I love you." She replied eyes glowing with the sincerity of her feelings, the depth of her heart.

Saitou was once again amazed, floored by the depth of her feelings. She was so young and really didn't or couldn't know what love was, but she did. She knew the kind of depth and self sacrifice it took to make it work. The girl had had her heart trampled on by the icicle after all. Which was convenient because he had been able to step in at that point and procure her for himself. Gaining Itachi's heart had been a steady and difficult process, a process that when he looked back on it, he did not regret it. And she had come to love him, as deeply as truly as anyone could. She meant it, as she spoke the words to him, and he knew she wasn't lying.

"You can be sad. Just don't keep me out" She told him.

"Why?" He asked her on a whim. He probably shouldn't have.

"I want to be with you. Even if you're sad. Whatever it is" She told him sincerely, wrapping her arms around his neck and hugging him. "This is your fault anyways, making me love you" She quipped with a delightful smile.

They both knew she didn't regret it. And truly neither did he if he was being honest. But when was he ever honest anyways? Besides he liked it when she was mad.

"Baka Itachi." He murmured, though his arms wrapping around her waist, squeezing her, holding her like a lifeline to never let go.