<em>~Nicci going from the dining room to the great hall in search of whiskey with Bo ~</em><br/><br/>Her hand once again going to stroke her name written on the place card, Nicci wondered how she would feel looking back at this night from the vantage of the future.  It was a hesitant beginning but that was all it was – a beginning – there was so much ahead of them all............ so much......<br/><br/>She looked up as Bo came to her side and smiled in answer to his unhesitatingly, the soft curve of his mouth too difficult to resist even if she had wanted to. She nodded taking the arm he proffered and let him lead her out of the room, both of them turning to go back to the hall and walking away from the others.  Her step faltered as he surprised her by tugging once more at the connection they had seemed to have earlier and she turned to look into his eyes.  She had thought that he was going to keep it light and gently flirt with her, he had seemed to want to turn off their obvious need for each other and even though she had not really understood why, in full, she did respect his wishes to take things slowly.<br/><br/>It took a moment before she could tear her eyes away from his, she felt herself so drawn to him, and the need to kiss him and feel his lips was so instant the heat of it flared in her eyes and she looked up the corridor quickly toward the double doors to the great hall, trying to get her heart not to beat so loudly.  She bit her lip and frowned slightly, feeling like a teenager on a first date and not knowing where she stood or how she should behave.  She was used to being the playmate and the confident flirt, she didn't know what it was about Bo that made her feel like a blushing school girl and she wasn't too sure she liked it.<br/><br/>It was a long time since she had been an innocent little girl.  She had grown up in the bleak hard environment of Crossways where to show any vulnerability was to offer yourself to be torn limb from limb by the wolves.  However much she had yearned for someone to look after her, to protect her, she had had to rely purely on herself and no-one else, until that was all she knew how to do.<br/><br/>Bo was unsettling her in so many ways and not the least blowing so hot and cold.  She knew it was a ridiculous contradiction in terms to both want him to gather her into his arms and take way all her choices and kiss her into submission and to also need him to play the gentleman, not asking for anything more than polite conversation - but that was how she felt. Perhaps it was the uncertainty and needing to know one way or the other if the mixed signals he was giving had any truth in them. She wasn't sure, but as they went through the door into the Great Hall and she pointed out the drinks tray and answered him lightly, “Well I'm happy to accompany you,” and then walked with him to the long narrow table against the wall with the row of decanters on it.<br/><br/>“Well at least they have labels on, so you won't need me to taste them all for you and tell you which is which,” she said pointing to the sliver plaques hung round the neck of each crystal decanter, “It's a good thing to, I'm such a lightweight when it comes to alcohol if I tasted all those I'd be curled up asleep under the table in no time.”