Author's Note: This is the original end of chapter 45/beginning of chapter 46 from my very long fic, Torture Without You. I decided that I don't like it—I think it's cheesy, overstated and also premature. Also, it's the third chapter containing smut in a row, which I think was a little much. So I cut it from the fic, but I know a lot of you liked it, so I thought I'd upload it separately (and then never look at it again!). For those who did like it, enjoy. :)


To own the feeling, you have to name it, Jane.

But if she named it, she had to own it. To deal with it. And if he didn't feel it too…

Was it real? How would she know if it wasn't? All she could say for sure was that she'd never felt this way about Oscar, and he was the only other romantic experience she had to compare this to.

She sat up, gazing at Kurt as though his face held all the answers. He was half lying down, propped up on pillows, and he took her hand as she drank in his expression—concerned, slightly puzzled, but also relaxed. She smiled down at their intertwined fingers, that wave of emotion pushing forward again, demanding acknowledgment.

Jane looked up into his face again, searching herself as much as him. When she put her hand to his face, the gesture reminded her of how she'd done the same the first night they'd met. But back then, his face had given her only questions. Now, she had answers, if she was brave enough to admit them.

But what if he—

She tuned out her fears, her worries, her doubts, and put her trust in the man who was so patiently waiting for her to speak.

"I love you."


Kurt's mind went blank with total disbelief. Then a deluge of conflicting thoughts crashed through his brain. When he'd watched her silently gazing at him, he'd tried to figure out what was going through her mind, but this hadn't even been on his list of possibilities.

"Jane…" Are you sure? he wanted to ask. You don't just have to say it because you think I want to hear it. Or because of a few orgasms in a row. I—

Embarrassment flooded her features. "It's okay. I don't expect you to say it back or anything. I just… I'm sorry. I'll go."

She almost succeeded in struggling out of his arms before he got over his shock. Grabbing her wrist as she got one foot on the floor, he pulled her back towards him into a brief, possessive kiss.

She pushed against his chest, stopping him, and turned her head towards the door. "You don't have to—"

Kurt kissed her again, softly this time, intent on proving to her without words how much he loved her. She remained tense for a few seconds, then melted against him, her tender, heartfelt kisses matching his.

When they drew back, he began to speak before she could express any more doubts. "I love you. You just surprised me—I didn't think you'd be ready to hear how I felt for a long time yet, let alone feel the same way."

Jane rested her forehead against his, smiling. "I already knew, deep down. I couldn't have said it if I wasn't sure how you felt."

Guess I didn't hide it that well. Still, the way she'd tried to escape bugged him. "Then why'd you try to run away?"

She pulled a rueful face. "I guess I wasn't that sure."

But she'd been sure enough to take a leap of faith. Cared enough—loved him enough—to lay out everything she felt, to build that connection he'd been craving.

"I'm sure," he said, holding her gaze. "I don't even have the words for how I feel about you. 'Love' isn't even enough. I just know that I need you with me. And I mean you—Jane Doe. Not Taylor Shaw. Not someone I thought you were, but everything I know that you are."

Jane's eyes teared up as something close to wonder filled her expression. "I don't understand how we got back here after everything that's happened. But I'm so glad we did."

Kurt settled her more firmly in his arms, leaning back against the pillows. "If this didn't tear us apart, I don't think there's anything out there that can."

"It did tear us apart," Jane pointed out. "For a while."

And he'd felt half dead inside the entire time. He hadn't wanted to admit it while she'd been in the black site, but the moment he'd laid eyes on her again, it had been impossible to deny the difference. "But we found our way back."

Jane spread her fingers through the gaps between his, intertwining their hands. "Because of you." She sighed. "I wanted to be angry. I was so hurt. But every time I panicked or needed help with my injuries, you were there. You had your own reasons to shut me out, but you always put them aside when I needed you."

"I had to. Because I loved you even before all this. I tried to tell myself I stopped while you were gone, but without you, I…" He shook his head.

"I thought you just felt guilty about me being in the black site at first. That you were helping me out of duty. But I think I knew it was more." She laughed, sending vibrations from her chest through his. "And so did Rich."

Kurt groaned. "If he ever learns we're having a naked conversation about him, we're going to have to kill him, you know that?"

She gave him a mischievous smile. "If not for him, I might not have said anything for a lot longer. You don't want to thank him by giving him that threesome he wants?"

"Hell, no," Kurt said emphatically. "And please, don't ever suggest that again. Though since you brought it up, now seems like a good time to make sure we're on the same page. You're okay with us being monogamous, right?"

In answer, Jane tilted her head up to kiss him again. "There's no one else for me but you."

Kurt sighed to cover his relief. "I guess now you've mentioned him, we might as well keep talking about him. What did Rich say to you while we were out of the room looking for the Akkadian?"

"That you love me. I told him I already knew, but that you deserved someone better." She shook her head, looking a little bemused. "He told me that you deserve to be with the person that you love. And that I should take advantage of the orgasms. I still can't figure out how he managed to come up with such a good point."

"About the orgasms?" Kurt teased.

She gave him a coquettish look. "Well, that too." Becoming serious, she confessed, "I wanted you to be happy, but I didn't think it could be with me, until Rich put it that way. Then I started to think about it some more, and I realised I was hurting you instead, by pushing you away. That's the last thing I want."

Kurt sent a silent thank you to Rich Dotcom for his intervention. The unexpected just kept happening tonight.

Jane traced her fingers down his arm. "I really am sorry I was so distant before. When we slept together. I thought I was taking the only thing I could get from you. I couldn't make myself believe that we'd ever be closer than that."

"You don't have to apologise." Thinking back over the nights they'd spent together before this one, Kurt smiled. "I was kind of surprised to hear you talking dirty."

"I guess I wanted to shock you. A little."

Intrigued, he tilted up her chin to look into her face. "And it turned me on. A lot."

Jane wasn't the blushing type, but he could have sworn her face was a little pinker as she admitted, "Hearing you ordering me to fuck you was pretty hot, too."

Arousal quickened his pulse, his cock beginning to stir in response. Jane noticed, and reached down between them to stroke her fingers up his growing erection. "I'm still pretty exhausted from earlier, but…" She kissed him, a slow, sensuous caress of her lips identical to the way her hand was moving. "If we don't get too energetic, I should be fine."

Kurt rolled her over onto the bed without a second's hesitation, his answering kiss just as slow and intense. He thrust against her, his hard-on sliding over her clit, making her sigh his name and tighten her arms around him.

Not wanting to make her sore after her lengthy session earlier, he kept the friction indirect, not penetrating her but rubbing his cock up and down her folds. After a while, she murmured something he couldn't quite make out and reached down to guide him inside her.

Kurt rose up on his elbows to gaze down at her, brushing her hair out of her face. "I love you, Jane."

She met his eyes, the emotion he was feeling mirrored in hers. "I love you."

He took her slowly, relishing every long, languid stroke in and out of her, watching her as she watched him. Experiencing what it was like to connect with her body and her soul simultaneously, the way he'd craved every time they'd had sex before this. She'd always shut him out, but now she was inviting him in.

"More, Kurt…"

Responding to her urging, he increased his pace, his depth, tilting his hips at the end of each thrust to hit her sweet spot. Jane met him every time, her breath trembling as she dug her fingers into his ass with one hand, and reached down to stroke him where they were joined even as she ground her clit into the heel of her hand.

Knowing from the coiling of her muscles that she wouldn't take long to spill over the edge, he buried his face in her neck and concentrated on his own pleasure, driving into her in quick, powerful thrusts.

"Ah—fuck, yes!" Jane's provocative cry was the last thing he registered before his climax obliterated everything else.

When the pleasure subsided enough that he could think again, he raised his head and found Jane smiling up at him, her gaze satisfied and full of the love she'd confessed to him. He gave her a lingering kiss, overwhelmed by everything he felt, and held her tightly, savouring this moment.

When he'd been back at military school, one of his friends had come back from a date, rolling his eyes because the young woman he'd been seeing had wanted to 'make love'. Without the emotional maturity and experience to appreciate the sentiment, both of them had laughed at the idea of sex being about anything but getting off.

Kurt had found himself thinking of that after his first night with Jane, finally sympathising with the girlfriend's point of view—Jane had shut him out so thoroughly, reducing sex to nothing but the seeking of a climax, that he'd felt that missing piece in a profound way. It had gotten a little better the second and third times they'd had sex, but it had still been just that—fucking.

This time, though…this had been what countless songs had been written about. He and Jane had made love.

He gave a private chuckle as he rolled off her and gathered her into the crook of his arm.

"What?" Jane asked, her eyes curious.

"Just thinking about how things change." He kissed her forehead. "Think we can get a few hours of sleep in before breakfast in bed?"

"You've given me thirteen orgasms since we got here. I could probably sleep for a month."

Kurt blinked. "Thirteen?"

"I lost count at one point, but yeah, I think so." She kissed his shoulder sleepily. "Good job, Deputy Director Weller."

"Believe me when I say it was my pleasure. But thirteen? Isn't that an unlucky number to stop at?"

Jane crossed her legs protectively, groaning and laughing at the same time. "I don't care. No more…"

Amused, Kurt reached for the mussed bedcovers and drew them up from the end of the bed. "I'll remind you that you said that later."

"Goodnight, Kurt," Jane murmured, already half asleep with her tattooed back facing him.

He brushed a kiss over the back of her neck, then reached for the bedside lamp, plunging them into darkness for the first time that night. "Sleep well, my love."