A/N: A fill for Wash/Taylor – Hold by BellaKit in the Friday One Word Challenge prompt post at the terranovafanfic comm on LJ (which might well have been me looking for a prompt to fit a plot bunny. But hell, I like it.)

Also, only I could make kid!fic smutty. Yes, this is kid!fic. Consider yourself duly warned that it may be saccharine sweet and OOC.

Alicia's first indication that someone wanted her attention was a tugging at the leg of her pants.

She looked down to see five (nearly six, as everyone knew since she wouldn't let them forget, nearly six) year old Bethany Taylor staring up at her, dark blue eyes wide as the force of her pulls made her pigtails bounce.

"Yes Bethany?" Alicia asked, not able to fight the smile on her face at the girl's earnest expression.

"Mama, how did Daddy propose?"

Alicia felt the blood run out of her face. To hide her sudden terror she bent down and scooped her daughter into her arms, seating her on her hip as they looked out over the market together. "Why do you want to know that?"

Bethany pointed her finger over towards the school. "Mrs Reynolds told me it was a cute story but that I should ask you."

Alicia followed her daughter's line of sight to find the woman in question standing nervously outside the door of the schoolhouse, looking straight at them. Maddy looked a mixture of amused (just a little, tiny bit) and terrified (a rather large, trembly bit).

Alicia sighed. The story was cute. When you'd had far too much to drink and were sharing it with your only true female friend in the colony over a bottle of finest red wine. When the man involved in the story was OTG and out of contact for a week and the fear was eating away at her. When Elisabeth Shannon knew how to draw blood out of a stone. She could only hope – fervently – that Elisabeth had taken the watered-down story that Alicia had spun her and made it positively dilute before sharing it with her daughter because Maddy can only have been upwards of about seventeen when the tale was first told and she did not want to be responsible for corrupting a minor.

"Mama?"

"Yes Bethany?"

"Why are you glaring at Mrs Reynolds?"

Because Mrs Reynolds only has a toddler at home and doesn't understand the danger of putting questions into children's heads. She thought. "I'm not glaring baby, there's just sun in my eyes." She said.

"So, how did Daddy propose?" Of course. The daughter of Nathaniel Taylor and Alicia Washington could be nothing if not persistent. "Was it sweet?"

Hands, teasing over sweat-slick skin. Teeth, biting at the juncture of her hip and thigh, scraping down over her skin as fingers delved into her heat. Sharp blue eyes staring up at her as her own rolled back in her head through sheer pleasure...

"Yes, I suppose you could say it was sweet."

"Were you happy?"

"Yes!" She screamed at the top of her lungs as his lips finally found her clit, tongue probing at her slick folds. She heard a deep chuckle, the rumble vibrating through her nerves and sending her back arching, her eyes screwing shut against the sensations he was invoking in her all-too-willing body. He slipped one finger into her, twisted and curled it until he found the spot that made her shout with joy...

"I was, yes."

Bethany nodded, resolution only a five (nearly six) year old could wear so innocently painted over her face. She tucked her head under Alicia's chin. "Was it a surprise?"

"What." She said. It wasn't even a question, just a statement.

"Marry me." He repeated. "I'm pretty sure I didn't mumble."

"You're joking."

He looked a little offended. "No."

"Please tell me you didn't do all... this, just to get me pliant enough to agree."

"Come on Wash." He said, leaning his chin on her stomach. "It's not that horrible a prospect is it?"

"No! No, not at all." She quickly said, threading her fingers restlessly through his hair as she considered the best way to diffuse this situation. "It's just... when I imagined you proposing I didn't see it going quite like this."

He watched her wince when she realised just what she'd admitted to "Ah. So you've imagined it, have you?"

She jutted her chin out and looked away from him as he started laying light kisses around her navel. "Maybe. I am woman, you know. Perfectly liable to flights of fancy as much as the next."

He grinned. "Oh, I know you're a woman alright..."

"It definitely was, sweetheart." Alicia murmured.

"And did you say yes straight away?"

"Will you marry me?" He asked. Punctuated it with a harsh thrust.

She bit her lip and nodded, head craning back as she groaned.

"Say it, Wash." He urged, withdrawing slowly before inching his way back in.

"Yes..." She hissed through clenched teeth as his hand covered her breast, palm rubbing over her nipple teasingly.

"Sorry, didn't catch that?"

"How... are you so... goddamn... composed?" She huffed.

"Important moment, Wash." He reminded her. "Want to remember it."

"Yes." She said, catching his gaze with her fierce brown eyes. "Yes. Happy now?"

He shrugged, thrusting forward again. "Hmm. One more time."

She groaned once more and bodily shoved him off of her, mounting him and sliding back down with a moan. "Yes! Yes, I will marry you you insufferable man!"

"I did, baby. First time."

"Of course you did." Came a voice from behind her.

"Daddy!" Bethany squealed, wriggling out of her mother's grasp and rushing over to her father.

Nathaniel scooped her up with a laugh and spun her around a couple of times before settling her on his hip much like his wife had earlier. "What are you doing out of school pumpkin?"

"Recess, silly."

Alicia watched as Nathaniel laughed, tickled by his daughter's easy way with words. "Of course. You'll have to forgive me, it's been a while since I went to school."

Alicia snickered - and wasn't that the truth? They'd both crossed into their next decade of age alarmingly quickly after Bethany had come along but neither showed signs of slowing down. Much to Shannon's chagrin, when he was frequently laid up by injury while the pair of them just kept on keeping on.

But, the reason was clear.

Now... now they had something to live for.