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Warm hands came to her shoulders, then she was wrapped in an embrace just as warm.
The corners of her lips curved upwards, contentment spread in her chest. Thin lips caressed her blonde locks and she squeezed the slender arms around her abdomen.
"I don't want the night to end," she whispered.
"And why not? That's quite... unlike you, in my opinion." Christopher said just as quietly beside her ear. She giggled a little.
"Unlike me how?"
"I thought sunrise appeals to you more."
She turned slightly, blue eyes meeting glassy-green ones. "I love sunrise. I love the sun. It's just that the night is so... quiet, like the world is still. The dark is so peaceful."
"Contradictory, don't you think?"
"It's a gift, to be able to appreciate the light and the darkness. The waters, the vegetation and the cities. It's a gift to look at the same thing but still discover at different times of the day, with different moods even." She paused abruptly, blinking a few times. Christopher was staring at her with the slightest hint of awe, smiling.
"I think I should return to bed," a sudden rush of embarrassment swelled in her chest. She turned to leave his embrace but he did not yield. "Aren't you sleepy as well?"
"A bit, but not as much as when I followed you out of bed." He said, "it's almost sunrise. Stay up with me? Just a bit more."
"As you wish, Mr Tietjens."
Then the first strand of sunlight came behind the horizon, the brief, rare moments in a day when the night and day became one, and Valentine squeezed her husband's arms again.