Diana's heart pounded in her chest like a hummingbird's wings. Her breath came short, and she could feel tears prickling her eyes as her arms went around his shoulders, tentatively at first. Then drawing him closer as she returned his kiss with three years of pent-up longing. When they parted, she thought that the only thing keeping her standing were his arms around her. She felt as if she might fly into bits.

"You have no idea how long I've wanted to do that," he said, cupping her cheek in his palm, and wiping away a tear with the ball of his thumb.

"You have no idea," she began, her voice barely above a whisper as her fingers closed over his and gave them a gentle squeeze, "how long I've wanted you to."

She closed her eyes, wanting to stretch the moment into eternity. He leaned forward to kiss her again, but her eyes flew open. "What about Wonder Woman?" she blurted out, heat rising in her cheeks. For a second—just one blissful second—she had forgotten. Steve looked taken aback by her outburst.

"I'll always have feelings for her," he said slowly and carefully.

"Feelings?" she echoed, suddenly feeling lightheaded, and almost as quickly as her sorrow had turned to her giddiness, joy turned to paralyzing fear. She took a step backwards, steadying herself against the small table next to the door as she waited for his answer.

"Feelings of gratitude," he went on, "for all those times she saved my life—and this country. Respect for her strength of spirit, her integrity. Admiration for her wisdom, her unfailing belief in the human spirit. Probably always some awe."

She took a deep breath. "But you don't... you don't love her?"

"I love her," he said simply, gently, and she felt her heart plummet into her shoes but she could not turn away—she was like a moth mesmerized by a flame, knowing how hot the fire would burn but unable to resist its flickering. "I love the way her smile can light up the entire world. I love her innocence, her gentleness, the child-like joy she takes in things we mortals take for granted. But you know what I love most?"

"What?" she whispered, tears gathering in her eyes once again.

"I love coming into the office every day, and seeing her across the room. She makes the best damned coffee in the world, and it's going to break my heart when she goes home."

All the blood had drained from Diana's face, and he could see the pulse beating wildly in the hollow of her throat. If he had been dismayed by her expression when he had kissed her days ago in a wild moment of joy that had changed his life forever, nothing could compare to the way the look on her face now made him feel. All he wanted in the world right now was to take her in his arms and hold her and never let go and promise her that it would be all right. That everything would be all right until she felt safe. Steve knew he had taken a risk—all he could hope for now what that he had not destroyed what he had so carefully won.

"How... how long have you known?" she finally asked, the knuckles of both hands white as she gripped the edge of the table so tightly he was afraid she might hurt herself. Yet, for all he knew, she was more likely to reduce the table to splinters beneath the pressure of her long, slender fingers.

"I wasn't sure," he admitted. "Not until just now. I asked Charlie for a copy of your service and personnel records on the sly. I told him it was for the letter, but something your sister said had me going crazy. She said you'd never stopped talking about me since you first saw me in the hospital. And sure enough, it was right there in black and white on the page. You were stationed at the Armed Forces Hospital before you worked at the War Department. You put in for a transfer the day I was released."

He took a step toward her, as carefully as if she were a wild animal who would spook and bolt if he made any sudden moves.

"All of your scheduled—and unscheduled—leave for the past three years coincided with an 'incident'. At least, that's what the paperwork said. The paperwork also said that Yeoman First Class Diana Prince's mother died in Akron Ohio in 1939, and she had a brother who was killed at Pearl Harbor. No sisters."

"No sisters," she echoed, her clear blue eyes filling with tears. He closed the distance between them in two steps. She was trembling when he gently took off her glasses and carefully set them on the side table. He leaned forward and pressed a kiss to her forehead, and took her face in both his hands.

"Ever since Friday night... I couldn't think of anything else. I've been driving myself crazy. All those times I wondered how you always knew just when I needed you most," he said as he traced the curve of her cheek with one callused thumb. "All those times I brushed off the questions of why Diana was never around when Wonder Woman appeared. I just never questioned it."

"You must hate me," she said through her tears.

"Hate you?" he asked mystified. "Diana, I love you."

He leaned forward and kissed her gently, and he could taste the salt of her tears on her lips. He broke the kiss, and smoothed her dark hair away from her brow with a smile. "I think I would have loved you no matter who you were. You could have been Wonder Woman, a navy nurse, or the Lemo Tomato Juice Girl, I don't think it matters. I think I've always loved you, and I always will."

"But I lied to you..." she began, and he shushed her with a finger against her lips.

"Then you must hate me for being a fool who couldn't see what was right in front of him until it was almost too late," he said firmly.

"But it is too late!" she said forcefully, shaking her head and stepping away from him. She walked into the middle of the piles of clothes, books, and boxes, hugging her arms to her as if she was cold and trying to warm them, her back to him. "It's too late. I have to go home," she said softly.

"Why?" he turned her to face him, not understanding. "Because your mother wants you at home? I don't accept that."

"She's not just my mother, Steve—she's my sovereign."

"Sovereign? But... but you're an American," he said, bewildered, and she shook her head.

Closing her eyes and taking a deep breath as if steeling herself for a battle, she looked him right in the eye and said "I was born over two thousand, four hundred and ninety years ago, west of the River Thermodon in a city-state ruled by Amazons called Themyscira. My mother is my Queen."

He sat down. He had to—he wasn't sure his legs could hold him upright.

Two thousand years was beyond the scope of what he could comprehend. He'd always known that Wonder Woman was a princess—Andros had called her that. He remembered so clearly that that maddeningly cool, silver-haired visitor from the heavens had shared a kind of kinship with Wonder Wo—with Diana that he couldn't begin to understand. And now he knew why.

He looked up and saw her watching him, uncertainty in those clear blue eyes that he'd looked into a hundred times before without ever really seeing them. To think that she had lived a hundred lifetimes before he had even met her....

She knelt at his feet, taking his hands in hers. "She is my Queen, but she's also my mother. When a mother demands you honor a promise—do you understand? I have no choice. There is no other choice I can make."

"Then I'll go with you," he said, and he knew even as he said it, that he would. He would follow this woman to the ends of the earth—to the very Gates of Hell. But he would never be parted for her for another minute. He couldn't stand the idea of it.

She shook her head. "You can't. Oh, Steve, I wish you could. More than anything in the world, I want to show you my home. Show you, so you can understand. But it is beyond impossible."

"Then... Then we'll run away," he said, knowing he must sound like a crazy man, and not caring one whit. "I'll leave the Army. We'll get married, and start somewhere fresh—"

She stopped him with a kiss, and when she broke it she leaned her forehead against his.

"If I ran away from my responsibilities," she said softly, "then I wouldn't be the same woman you fell in love with. And you wouldn't be the Steven Trevor I have loved since the moment I first set eyes on you."

He swallowed, feeling a rawness in his throat and a tightness in his chest as he realized she was right. But that didn't make it any better.

"Then what do we do?" he asked, at a loss.

"We make the most of the time we have," she said gravely, her eyes searching his for the answer to a question she didn't know how to voice.

With an air of solemnity, he reached up and removed the pins from her hair, letting the soft dark curls fall over her shoulders. Leaning forward, he kissed her—the lightest brush of his lips against hers. She sighed, her breath warm against his lips, and kissed him back. It was a kiss both sweet and urgent in its intensity, and in it he found all the words he had lost, all the things he could not say but desperately wanted to. And for a time, they were all the words either of them needed.

Author's Note: Please, if there's anything that doesn't work for you, or is factually or grammatically incorrect, don't hesitate to tell me! Constructive criticism is the greatest gift you can give an author. I'm not a delicate flower who will curl up and die at the first sign of criticism. I want to make this story the very best I can, so please let me know what works for you, and more importantly, what doesn't.