Rick turns away from her, looking down across the expanse of the bed, her place that she just climbed out of.

"Rick!" She demands, emotion soiling her voice and electrifying the air in his bedroom. Her heart has never felt this... cracked. It's not broken, she's not resolved to this. Does he even know that she's committed to him? Was their relationship so tattered and broken from everything that they went through that he really wanted to erase it all from history? "Rick, answer-"

"It wasn't because of you." He says softly under her demanding, soiled voice as she stands a few feet away from the edge of the bed in nothing but his damaged shirt that she tore open hours ago.

She feels her heart slink up her throat like bile. It's a feeling that's clawed at her like a wild animal before. Meredith, Vaughn, her job in DC. This was always the part of their relationship she's feared the most. Opening up to him is one thing. It's easy, he makes it easy; with his smile, his eyes, his arms and non-judgemental tone. Opening up to him at times, she's felt she's done a good job. Letting him shoulder her insecurities and vulnerabilities and weaknesses with her was a huge step for her.

But getting him to let her shoulder his? It's a beast that she doesn't know how to tame. She has to do things she's not entirely built for.

As his eyes turn away from her, his head twisting against the flat surface of the bed, Kate feels every fiber of her tug her toward him. "Rick," she calls to him in a soft voice, trying to get him to look at her. It's a small test to see how think he's shoring up his walls. She still can't imagine how he spent four years doing this with her.

When all that happens is his chest rising as he takes in a long breath, committing himself to not making eye contact just yet, she cranes her neck and brushes a stray strand of hair behind her ear.

"Baby," she says in a softer voice, stepping toward the bed and stretching out her hands to him, "come here."

Rick looks over to her with a deep arch in his brow, feeling ashamed, small, weak, and so petty for letting all this surface, but doesn't have the stomach to quip his way out of this and just throw her off. He scoots himself across the expanse of the bed, draping the thin sheet over his bottom half and swinging his legs out, letting her take his hands as she settles herself down onto his lap, just as she did the morning of the day she told him she loved him for the first time.

In his mind, it's not because he wants to open up to her, or because it's a talk he needs to have, or because it will be good for their relationship in the long run. He just feels too embarrassed right now to turn her away.

Kate sits down in his lap and looks down to his chest. "Babe, I want you to say something to me."

Rick feels his expression echo his true feelings despite the mask he's telling himself to put on, and looks into her eyes.

She gives his hands a squeeze before meetings his gaze. "I want you to say that I love you."

He lets out a breath that he strains to keep from shaking as it fans off her chest. Now he got her to think that he doesn't love her? "I know that I love you, Kate." He says with as much honesty as he can, shaking his head slowly and looking up to her eyes.

Kate smiles softly and shakes her head with him. "No, baby," she almost coos. Rick stops and looks back up to her with his neck craned, his head leaned down into the space between them. "I want you to say," she starts again, slower as she reaches over and takes his hand and presses it to her chest, "that I," she pauses to press her hand to his chest, mirroring the gesture she made for him, "love you."

Rick's spine tightens as he looks down to his hand, focusing on a spot in between his third and fourth finger. That's right where it should be. He lets out a long, hard breath that he'd been holding. "You love me."

Kate's smile flashes onto her face briefly when she hears the words and pets his chest with the hand she has pressed into him. "Say it again."

He nods slightly and moves his hand up the valley of her breasts, dipping his head further between them, committing himself to the statement. "You love me."

Kate takes her other hand and places it on his jaw, pulling his eyes back up to meet her. She pets his stubble softly before softly coxing him again. "Again."

He moves his other arm around her back and holds her gaze, feeling himself being ripped open to her. "You love me."

She pets his jaw and smiles warmly down to him before pulling him to her lips. They meet in an emotionally tempered kiss, seeking comfort and safety in each other as her arms drape over his shoulders, deepening their kiss and seeking more of him as she presses her lips against him harder, putting her hand on his head. After he's earned another soft moan, she tickles the back of his scalp with the tips of her nails and pulls back, her eyes shining.

"When you were missing," she begins, speaking the memory as it comes to her mind, "at night, when I'd go to bed," she begins to admit, looking down to his chest, "I'd climb under the covers and see you weren't there."

Rick quickly engulfs her in his arms, moving his arms around her and pressing his hands flat against her back.

"I missed you so much and I thought I'd never see you again, so..." she trails off, feeling her eyes burn again, but knowing that he's here for her, just like he always is, "so I'd turn toward your side of the bed, every night, and I'd recite my vows." She tells him with a sad smile as she looks back up at him. "Sometimes I'd say them three or four times because," she blinks hotly, pressing away the tracks of her tears, "because I thought I'd never get the chance to say them to my husband."

Rick can't take this feeling in his heart anymore. "Kate, I'm so sorry about the wedding. I-"

"Hey," she stops him, shaking her head with a smile and pressing the pads of her fingers to his lips to silence him. "I already told you, Rick, I never blamed you for what happened."

Rick looks off to the side, a hard chill coming into his eyes as his jaw tenses under her fingers. "Don't placate me, okay?"

Kate's smile slowly starts to fade, watching him chill under her touch. "What do you mean?"

"I saw you when you showed me that tent you found by that lake, Kate." A sickening feeling snakes through her system when he says that. "I heard you, I know you think I left and stayed away on purpose. I know you doubted me, so don't say you never blamed me for what happened."

Her dry throat tries to get the words out, but she can't manage it. And it's this part where she'd usually continue to pet his stubble and coax him back into the sheets, make love, and they'd forget about it. "Rick," she starts in a whisper, "one of the things I love most about you," she begins to tell him, figuring there's no better way to tell him, "is how much you believe in me... how much faith you always seem to have in the people you care about."

Rick deflates as she snakes her arms back around his neck. He can't really figure out why that's one of the things she loves about him. For everyone else, that part of him has always been a weakness everyone else has exploited. And since that's how everyone else used it, that's how he sees it, as a weakness. But he bottles that back up where it belongs and lets her continue.

"And I know," she breaks his thoughts with her soft voice, "that I haven't always treated that the way I should have in the past. I know I've probably taken advantage of that at times. But," she trails off, a smile breaking her face apart as she looks back up to him, "I'm always amazed at how you always maintain such unwavering faith in me. I'm always amazed at how much you always seem to believe in me... or believe in us. Sometimes I'm even envious of it." She admits, her smile dissipating. "Because you're right."

His heart cracks inside of his chest again, but he tries his hardest to power through it and maintains eye contact.

"If it was you in that position, Rick, you'd..." she stops to draw in a defiant breath, "ignore all evidence and all reason that tells you I betrayed you and you'd have faith that I'd never do that to you. You'd believe in me against everything rational. And I wish," she emotionally exclaims with a roll of her eyes as she meets his gaze again, "that I had it in me to have that kind of faith in someone... the way you do. Because the fact is that I do love you and I know that you'd never miss our wedding for anything. I'd," she says, her throat closing, "like to spend the rest of our lives with you teaching me how."

Rick breathes softly, feeling his heart heal itself slowly.

After a moment, Kate smirks as a strand of hair falls in front of her face. "That's in my vows."

Sneaking around his defenses, that earns her a bright smile from him and a soft, airy chuckle as he pulls at her with his arms around her. He looks down, tracing a strand of her hair with his eyes, as he speaks. "You asked why I wished we'd never met."

The loving air between them vanishes in a flash and she's pulled right back to the bile in her throat, the feeling of having to push against his walls, instead of the satisfaction of opening up to him and accepting her. But it's squashed soon after by her heartache. "Were we so bad together that you'd call upon mystical forces to erase us?"

"It wasn't because of you." He says again, looking up to her with a glimmer in his blue eyes. "Kate," he starts with a twinge in his voice, looking down to the opening of his shirt she has hanging off her shoulders, "without me in your life, you're the captain of the Twelfth." He says to her with a smile, looking back up to her. "Without me, you never had your apartment bombed. Without me, Montgomery is still alive. Because you never met me, you..." he trails off, looking back down to her chest painfully, reaching back around her and placing his hand where her scar should be, "without me you never had to go the pain I put you through."

As his finger circles a small space in the center of her chest, her breath is drawn out of her lungs. "Babe," she starts softly, "what if I were to tell you that all of the hassle and trauma I've put you through and the worry I've put your family through being my partner all these years wasn't worth us being together?"

Rick's brow creases deeply and he quickly looks back up to her. "I d-"

He cuts himself off, the words forming meaning in his head before he can finish them. And as his eyes let go of the fire that she ignited and drift shut, she catches his jaw as his head starts to dip. She pulls his eyes back up to her with a smile. "What?"

He sighs softly, "I'd say I don't care." Kate lets out a breath and feels her smile brighten. "I'd say I'd walk through Hell and back if it meant being with you."

"So why can't the same go for me?" She asks in the same soft, gentle voice. "Why can't you believe that I love you just as much to put myself through hell for you?"

It's this time that he forces himself to answer honestly. "Because I've never had anyone love me that honestly before."

When she gets her answer, it makes her heart ache and she reaches back around him, petting his hair in a loving motion that lets him know she's not going anywhere, giving him permission to continue.

He lets out a strained breath and grits his teeth. "It's real with you, Kate. Gina fought with me constantly and came after me for alimony payments. Meredith cheated on me. Kyra fled the country. So," his jaw clenches again as he looks away from her, "after that many tries, it's hard to believe that I actually managed to find someone that says that and actually means it."

"But Rick," she chuckles under her breath, smiling again, "shouldn't that be a part of believing in someone? Especially me? You think I didn't know what I was promising when you asked me to marry you?"

"I know," he sighs in a hard breath. "I'm supposed to be better than this." He says, craning his neck shamefully.

But she cups his jaw again and pulls him back up to her gaze. "Rick," she breathes, "I love you. And just like you," she says, softly palming his bandaged shoulder, "I'd walk through Hell and back if it meant being with you. Dunn bombing my apartment, getting shot, Maddox getting away, Tyson," she rattles off, "I'd go through all of it over again as long as I got you. And so what our wedding got ruined?" She says with a casual shrug of her shoulders. "So what if we never have that big beautiful ceremony? BFD."

With that, Rick's face splits in a bright smile, once again having her sneak around his defenses. Softly laughing with her, he looks up to her after a moment, he looks back up to her gaze, their eyes sparkling with love, a familiar connection forming between them.

"So, are we okay now?" Kate asks, putting her fingers back into his hair.

Rick smiles softly and massages the dip of her spine. "I'm starving. You know the loser who lives in this loft in this universe doesn't cook?"

Kate smiles with him, the thought of food sounding inticing. "Martha around?" She asks, wiggling her brow at him.

"Thankfully," he says with a husky tone, running his hand up and down her thigh, "she stays out most of the time and Alexis is visiting with some friends all day and won't be home until tonight."

"Mmm," she hums and snakes her arms around his neck, pulling herself closer to him, "maybe we should liven this universe up with that breakfast thing we used to do back at my place."

Rick jumps with eagerness underneath her and starts to climb out from under her. "I'll get the spatula."